


The Best of Intentions

by Kantrips



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Office, Basically just a Rom-Com, F/M, Fluff, Humor, Or slow burn-ish, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-25
Updated: 2017-12-01
Packaged: 2019-01-05 05:08:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 31,402
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12183486
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kantrips/pseuds/Kantrips
Summary: Cullen’s sister misinterprets a photo sending events snowballing out of control when Evelyn agrees to pretend be Cullen’s date for one night. Agrees all too happily in fact, as Evelyn can sense an opportunity to win Cullen’s gratitude and thus get a tame accountant on her side at work. However, the course of fake true love never did run smoothly and Cullen and Evelyn should have known that interfering friends, colleagues and family were never going to let them pull this deception off as planned.





	1. Misunderstanding

 Slipping into the semi-darkness of the corridor, paying particular care to closing the door quietly so as to not draw attention to her exit, Evelyn let out a small sigh of relief. The music thrummed on in the conference room she had left and being away from it was a welcome reprieve. She had told them she was heading to the bathroom, but a bigger escape had been necessary. For a moment at least: she knew the quiet was temporary and she would have to return to their brimming joviality and teasing shortly. For now though, she intended to savour the stolen minutes of blissful, long awaited peace. She leaned against the wall and closed her eyes.

“Hello,” came a voice from the shadows, causing Evelyn to shriek, her eyes snapping open. Cullen stepped forward, glowing phone in one hand, glass in the other, both raised as if in surrender. “Sorry I startled you.”

Heart still racing Evelyn squinted at him through the gloom. She did not know Cullen well: only that he worked in accounts, had a reputation for being a stickler for the rules and thus was generally condemned in her circle for being a bit of a bore. “What are you doing lurking out here?” she asked, fumbling for words through her shock.

“I could ask you the same question,” he replied, sounding amused.

Pulse gradually returning to normal, Evelyn shook her head. “Sorry, you just gave me a bit of a start.” She eyed his phone. “Working?”

He dimmed the screen. “Just checking in on a few things.”

“Fear not: I won’t turn you in to the Inquisition.”

“Pardon?”

“Working at the end of year party: a crime punishable by death according to some of our colleagues. Leliana has spies everywhere looking for people not having enough fun but I won’t turn you in.”

Finally comprehending her joke Cullen chuckled. “I appreciate your discretion. And what about you? Are you having a sufficient amount of fun to see you safe from reprisal?” Evelyn let out another sigh in answer. “I see,” he said sympathetically. “Congratulations by the way, on the award.”

Employee of the Year: Evelyn Trevelyan. It had been a humiliating night entailing an awkward, unprepared speech she was put on the spot for, a string of posed photos with the company elite (her teeth gritted into a forced smile) and her friends mockingly addressing her as ‘Your Majesty’ and insisting on pulling her seat out. “Don’t you start too; I am copping enough flack in there about it. They will still be laughing about it come next year’s party.”

“My congratulations were sincere,” Cullen replied firmly. “You show a clear talent for your role and are obviously a dedicated worker. I don’t find anything amusing about merit and hard work being formally recognised.”

“Oh,” Evelyn replied, a whole new kind of embarrassment making her shift her weight from foot to foot. “Well, thanks. I guess.” Cullen finished the rest of his drink and put the glass down on the photocopier beside him. He raised his phone back to his face and the light flicked on once more. “Are you really going to go on working out here?” Evelyn asked, feeling dismissed and strangely miffed about it.

“I thought you promised not to betray my secret.” He looked at her over the top of his phone, face illuminated by the screen, eyebrows raised.

“That doesn’t mean I approve of it. Come on, at the very least if I have to suffer in there you should too.”

“Very self-sacrificing of you,” Cullen said with heavy sarcasm. He pocketed the phone but made no other move back towards the party. Neither did Evelyn. “I thought you enjoyed these things. Or at least, that everyone enjoyed these things except for me.”

“I do!” Evelyn said quickly. “Sometimes. And other times they are just very... a lot.”

He gave her a wry smile. “To say the least. Long day?”

“Yes. Long week actually…month even…”

“Well that is what it evidently takes to become Employee of the Year. I would expect nothing less.”

“Now you _are_ teasing me! Watch yourself, any more of this kind of covert working behaviour and you will be next!”

With a smug smile, Cullen pushed up his jumper sleeve to look at his watch, angling it to better read the face in the lowlight. Trust him to be still using an analogue. “Not long now until we are in the acceptable zone for excuses being made for leaving.”

“Yes – I think I left the stove on and my cat needs feeding or something.”

“Damn, those were mine.”

“You take the stove, I’ll take the cat.”

“Deal. Works for me, particularly as I don’t have a cat.”

“Me neither, but I plan on saying it assertively and walking away quickly.”

“You are a woman of sound strategy.” Cullen picked up his empty glass which Evelyn felt a kind of gratitude for. The small detail pleased her: a show of respect towards the cleaning staff that they rarely received from most in the wake of these kind of work functions. “With our tactics ready for deployment I suppose we have no choice but to enter the fray once more.” He stepped forward and in a moment of gallantry that Evelyn could not interpret as either sarcastic or sincere, offered his arm. After a moment of hesitation, she took it.

“Have courage. It will be over soon,” she told him.

He opened the door and the vivid colours and lights immediately confronted them as they entered. Glasses clinked and voices grew louder and louder as people fought to have conversations over the music.

They were barely two steps from the doorframe when Cullen halted and said something, his words lost in the racket surrounding them.

“What?” Evelyn yelled over the din.

He spoke again, and still holding his arm, Evelyn used it to pull herself closer to the level of his face to hear better. He leaned down to meet her. “I said it is louder than I remembered!” He smiled at her and seeing the irony in the situation Evelyn laughed.

The event photographer appeared before them, bursting suddenly from the crowd like a bird from undergrowth, startling them both with an obnoxiously bright flash. Squinting, Cullen and Evelyn both stepped in opposite directions in a belated attempt to get out of the frame but it was too late.

Evelyn was sick of photographs: she had been in enough for one night. “Varric!” she yelled. “What was that for? Haven’t you got enough already?”

“You never know when these might come in handy for marketing materials,” he said casually.

Evelyn rolled her eyes. “Bribery materials more like. I thought there was a rule about no photos after people start getting sloppy.”

Varric laughed. “Are you indicating that you are sloppy Evelyn? I didn’t think you had had half the drinks people were trying to encourage you to have.”

“You are right on that front. If I had I would be dead.” Evelyn looked to her left but Cullen had disappeared into the crowd. She felt a little abandoned by his abrupt departure, which was extremely odd as they were seated at different tables. He had no cause to wait for her.

For a moment they had shared an understanding and felt like allies, that was all, Evelyn rationalised and satisfied with her conclusions, returned to her seat. Varric followed, mimicking a trumpet fanfare as she approached her friends while Dorian and Sera leapt up to perform bows and curtseys that they had clearly been rehearsing in her absence. The antics of her companions were enough to make her immediately forget the brief moment shared with Cullen, and she did not think of it again for the remainder of the night.

Nor over the next week of holidays.

In fact, Evelyn only thought of it again when she was browsing the gallery of photos from the night on the company social media page, and saw the picture of the two of them together: arms linked, faces close together, him smiling, her laughing at something he had said though she couldn’t for the life of her remember what it had been.

It would be five months, until they spoke again. Actually spoke, that is, outside of infrequent, to-the-point work emails.

* * *

 

“Oh Maker,” Dorian sighed, leaning back in his chair, “here comes the fun police.”

“What?” Evelyn snapped. She was focusing on a tricky negotiation by email and had been struggling to get the tone right. Distractions were unwelcome and she hoped that Dorian would get the hint and leave her in peace.

“That accountant. The extra dull one.” Evelyn did not need any further description to identify the individual in question. Cullen. Dorian had taken a particular dislike to him. Something about the way he always talked work at the afterhours functions, by the coffee machine and in the lift had Dorian going to particular lengths to avoid him.

Remembering their brief interchange at the end of year party, Evelyn felt a small surge of loyalty. “Don’t be mean. He can’t help…” What was she going to say? Being boring? Evelyn started again with a different tack. “I am sure he has a great personality, when he is not talking about accounts.”

“But he is _always_ talking about accounts. He lives, breathes and eats accounts.”

“I am sure that is not true.”

“What is true is that he was put on this planet – more specifically this office – solely to torture me with his excruciating and insufferable passion for work.”

“There you go again, thinking the world revolves around you.”

“What is he doing? Just hovering there by the door? Has he not little spreadsheets to lovingly tend?”

Tearing her gaze from her monitor, Evelyn glanced over her shoulder to follow his line of sight across the office. Cullen locked eyes with her and she turned quickly back to her computer. Dorian hissed. “Now you’ve done it: you made eye contact! That is a sign of aggression in wolves.”

“Fortunate then, that neither of us are wolves. Is he coming over?”

“I am sorry to say that he is.” Evelyn wanted to let out a tiny curse but refused to give Dorian the satisfaction after her feeble attempts to defend the man. “What chit-chat shall he bless us with today? The many joys of a good pivot table?”

“Shh,” Evelyn reprimanded, worried Cullen might overhear as he crossed the office. Truth be told she had a pretty good idea of why he wanted to speak to her and guilt simmered in her gut.

A few moments later he was at her desk. “Cullen! Good to see you!” Dorian greeted with false enthusiasm. “And what timing – Evelyn here was just saying that she would just _love_ someone to go into more detail about the figures on page seventy-eight of last year’s annual report.” Evelyn was chewing on the end of her pen anxiously.

“Hello Dorian,” Cullen replied in a deadpan way that indicated he knew he was the subject of an ongoing joke. “Evelyn,” he greeted, with a shade more civility. She looked up at him, and disliking the feeling of being loomed over, rolled her chair back a couple of paces to even out their eyelevel marginally. His hands were clasped. She found his guarded, impassive expression nearly impossible to read.

If he had come to see her in person she must be in really serious trouble. What if he was planning to report her to management?

Deciding to try and get the upper hand she cast her pen aside and launched into an apology. “I can’t apologise enough Cullen, I promised that it wouldn’t happen again but…” she began earnestly. “I know I have been sloppy with record keeping! I just keep leaving it and putting it off and by the time I get back to it a few minor details may have slipped my mind once or twice…but I am 99.9% confident that I have been underestimating the number of units so I figured it would be a nice surprise when –”

“You’ve been fabricating the figures you send to me?” he asked flatly, but with a genuine look of surprise on his face.

“Not making them all up exactly no! Compiling incomplete information and making an educated guess in order to extrapolate…Wait, you aren’t here about that?”

“No.”

“Oh,” Evelyn said quietly, feeling heat rising up her neck. She loosened her scarf. Talk about self-sabotage. Dorian and his flawless bookkeeping would never let her live this down.

“No, I wanted to speak to you about something else.”

“Okay,” Evelyn replied still feeling humiliated.

“In private.” Cullen added curtly. Dorian sniggered, without much of an attempt to conceal it and Evelyn shot him a glare before standing.

“Okay,” she said again, and smiled weakly at Cullen, a gesture that he did not return before turning and walking towards the emergency exit. As she followed him, completely perplexed, she felt her phone buzz in her pocket and fished it out.

A new message from Dorian: _‘Asking you out to an accounting convention or challenging you to a duel I wonder? I couldn’t tell.’_

In reply, Evelyn looked back at him and gestured with an exaggerated shrug. Dorian rose and scampered off, no doubt to find someone to tell in time for them to witness her and Cullen emerging from a stairwell as no doubt they wouldn’t believe him otherwise.

Cullen held the door for her and followed her out. The heavy door swung shut and the quiet pressed on them after the bustle and chatter of the large office, like diving underwater. Cullen pondered for a moment, then led her down a flight of stairs to another landing. For extra privacy, Evelyn assumed. Curiosity was giving way to nerves. What exactly did he want from her? Despite Dorian’s insinuations she felt it extremely unlikely that this was as simple as a request to grab a drink together.

“So, what can I do for you?” she asked, breaking the silence. Better to get it over with, she figured.

“Start tracking your sales properly,” Cullen answered then squeezed his eyes closed and pushed his glasses on top of his head so that he could pinch the bridge of his nose. “Sorry, I didn’t bring you here to reprimand you.”

“Goodness knows I deserve it,” Evelyn laughed. Cullen did not join her but gave her a long, serious (even more serious than usual which was saying something) look and folded his arms. Evelyn’s laughter died in her throat. “You had better just be out with it: I am starting to think this is really bad news.”

“No, I did not mean to alarm you. It is not bad news. Well, not for you.” Evelyn assumed he was about to continue and waited, but when he did not speak there was an excruciatingly long pause.

“Are you alright?” She reached out to touch his arm. It was gesture that was habit to her when she was concerned about a friend, but she caught herself before her fingertips reached his sleeve, wondering if it was too overfamiliar. Instead she turned the movement into an awkward tousle of her hair. She hoped he hadn’t noticed. A slight frown indicated that he had. Evelyn was suddenly relieved at his earlier insistence for privacy: if Dorian and the others could see this exchange she would never hear the end of it.

“I am fine. I just find myself in a difficult position.” The frown intensified.

It genuinely worried her to see someone usually so composed so troubled.  What had he been doing to get into ‘a difficult position’? Forging numbers? Stealing from the accounts? It seemed unlikely: by all reports and as evident by a rapid series of promotions he was as honest as he was meticulous. It was impossible to question his integrity. When he failed to elaborate once again she prompted gently: “Anything in particular?” And more importantly, what on earth did he think she could do to help?

“My sister. No, the last work function.”

“I may yet require a few additional details to piece together what the issue is Cullen.”

“We spoke at the end of year work drinks.”

“I recall.” Baffled. Evelyn was completely baffled.

“A photo was taken. My sister saw it.”

“I see,” Evelyn answered though she did not see. At all.

“I did not seek to mislead her. I said nothing on the matter. I only spoke of you briefly, because she asked. I would not set out to deceive  intentionally, especially in a way that involved you,” he said emphatically, but with something almost pleading in his tone.

“I don’t doubt it,” Evelyn assured him.

“However my sister jumped to certain conclusions. About us. Together.”

“Oh.” Evelyn chuckled awkwardly. “Well, that should be easy to clear up. Right?”

Cullen put a hand to his face. “The opportunity arose for me to clarify a long time ago and I did not take it,” he said, voice slightly muffled.

“But why? I don’t understand.”

“Mia. She lives out of town and she worries about me. It has been a long time since I last…She has always been the social butterfly and I have been more…”

‘Reclusive and surly’, Evelyn thought. “Introverted and private?” she said instead. It was painful, watching Cullen all but writhe with humiliation, not least because she was fighting back laughter. It was her default reaction to feeling self-conscious but she sensed she might actually kill the man in front of her stone dead if she laughed in his face at this moment. Evelyn bit the inside of her lip in an effort to control herself.

“I thought nothing would come of it. She said she was writing you an email of introduction and I feared she already had and what you must be thinking.”

“I haven’t received anything,” Evelyn said. No wonder he had rushed to speak with her – imagine the confusion if she had heard from his sister out of the blue. It would have been…Evelyn pondered. Well, actually it would have only been slightly more confusing than the current situation.

“She - Mia will be visiting me next week. This Friday we are having dinner. I meant to tell her that we parted ways by now…before it came to this. But I just haven’t been able to. She has been so looking forward…to meeting you,” Cullen explained, eeking out the final few words as if they caused him physical pain.

“‘Parted ways’,” Evelyn echoed, voice shrill. “That is a nice way of putting it. I didn’t even know we had been dating all this time and now you are breaking up with me?”

Cullen looked stricken. “No! I did not intend to –”

“Relax, I am teasing you,” Evelyn clarified. He looked relieved (barely) but Evelyn was distracted. Even as she spoke her mind was working frantically. Opportunity beckoned, floodlit and glittering. Her record keeping often needed help. A lot of help. Cullen was an accountant. And for the first time ever she (possibly anyone) had him at a disadvantage. A possible ally. A tame accountant. A ‘get out of jail free’ card for next time she was in strife. All she had to do was make sure he owed her. Real big. She hesitated, then went for it. “You will have to get used to my sense of humour, if we are to be a couple for an evening.”

Cullen froze. Evelyn was pleased to finally feel like she had control of the conversation. “I was in no way suggesting such a course of action. I merely wanted to explain and apologise for my presumption. I would never ask such a thing.”

Evelyn cocked her head to one side, then the other, lips pursed in thoughtfulness as she surveyed him. Cullen looked as if he was considering hurling himself down the stairwell to escape her scrutiny. “No, you wouldn’t ask, would you. But I am offering, so think about it, all the same.”

After a pause, he let out a distrustful: “But why?”

“Well don’t start questioning it!” Evelyn laughed. “Friends get each other off the hook all the time,” she explained with a flippant wave of her hand. She had been to more family events on Dorian’s arm than she had with some of her past boyfriends. Frankly he usually turned out to be a better date too. Not to mention the number of times Blackwall had intervened when she was struggling with an overfriendly stranger at a bar by playing the just arrived, overprotective and frankly enormous boyfriend.

“I did not realise this was such a common eventuality,” Cullen said, slightly dumbstruck.

“Sooo common,” Evelyn said dismissively, determined to put him at ease. “It is simple, okay? We go and have a nice dinner, I fawn over you - not too much, but a little,” Evelyn explained when Cullen looked moderately terrified at the prospect of being fawned over. “Then after a few weeks, you pass on the news of our break up to your sister making sure you sound pretty sad about it all and she respectfully gets off your back for a few months at least while you mourn. Easy.”

Cullen looked unconvinced, verging on downright sceptical. “Truly though, why so keen to be of assistance?”

“Suspicious, aren’t you? I figure I probably owe you a few favours, my accounts what they are. Have been.” And what they likely would be knowing her track record. She could probably get away with submitting blank sheets at the end of each week for the next year and he wouldn’t be able to object after she did this for him. Besides: how could she resist an accountant in distress? She continued: “Plus, I assume you are paying for my dinner. Are we going somewhere nice? Is there a wine list I can review in advance? I am picky about pairings,” Evelyn demanded, hands on hips, grin tugging at the corner of her lips. She had him, she nearly had him. Hook, line and….

For the first time, he managed a small smile and thrusting his hands into his pockets he assumed a more relaxed posture. “Thank you. I know this is utterly ridiculous.”

Sinker. He would be in her debt and overflowing with gratitude before he even realised what a shambolic state her accounts could get into and by then his sense of duty and ridiculous politeness would mean he couldn’t possibly refuse helping her. And all she had to do was go out for one dinner. Evelyn could have fist pumped but it would have given the game away.

Instead she said with a shrug: “We do strange things to make our families happy.”

“I am grateful. However, if this could be kept quiet, amongst colleagues…”

“Of course, “she answered quickly with a long-repressed giggle finally spilling out. “I am not particularly keen to get _this_ rumour off the ground trust me!” she laughed, rapidly pointing between the two of them a few times. Cullen narrowed his eyes slightly and Evelyn balked. “Not that there would be anything wrong with – You are very – I would be – You know I think we should get back to work.”

“I agree.” His office was a few floors below hers, he began to make his way down the stairs.

“Wait,” she called after him. “We should probably meet up, briefly at least, to go over some things.”

“Things?”

“You know, to make this even moderately convincing I should probably know more about you than you name, job title and what colour tie you happen to be wearing today.”

“Of course.” He shook his head looking slightly mollified. “You really have done this before.”

“I am a bit of an expert, what can I say? Trust me, this will work out just fine. I’ll be in touch.”

“Hmm,” he replied uncertainly before continuing down the stairs.

“Wait!” Evelyn cried. He stopped again, gripping the bannister, and turning to look over his shoulder, frowning slightly.

“Yes?” he asked carefully. Perhaps he thought she had changed her mind.

“If you are uncomfortable about…this please don’t be. I am happy to be of help. Truly.”

“I appreciate it,” he replied with a nod, then a smile so warm that all of a sudden it was Evelyn who was left feeling embarrassed.

“Okay! See you later alligator!” she replied in a high-pitched voice that certainly could not be her own and leaving abruptly, rushed back towards the emergency exit and her office taking the steps two at a time.

She paused at the door just long enough to compose herself before stepping through it? “’See you later alligator?’ Maker have mercy, just strike me down now,” she muttered to herself, but the Maker did not oblige her request.

How long had she been ignoring how handsome he was? It was like something had just clicked and she had seen him for the first time: amber eyes, high cheekbones, straight nose, teeth like a ruddy dentistry clinic brochure. Maybe she had never looked at him as a person before. Perhaps he had just been a concept: another accountant to get irritated with her. What was wrong with her: he had shown one moment of true human weakness and the veil had been lifted?

Evelyn tried to rationalise: if she was going to get that flustered every time he smiled at her it would do wonders for their performance on Friday night and that could only be a good thing.

Beyond that she decided to endeavour not to think of it.

Re-entering the office, Evelyn expected a crowd at her desk but Dorian had only had the time (or mercy) to drag over one person.

“Evelyn, as lovely as it always is to see you, your arrival at your own desk hardly constitutes ‘the Sky Holidngs intrigue of the century’ as I was promised,” Josephine greeted her. “Though you do look a little flushed.”

“Is that what he told you? Sorry to disappoint but there is nothing to see here,” Evelyn told her, glaring at Dorian before resuming her seat.

“But what did he want? Did he gift you a bouquet of calculators? Try to seduce you with an offer of a six-month top-tier subscription to Business Insider? Did he compare your beauty to a finance report, warm and unblemished, fresh off the printer?”

“Nothing of the sort. He wanted to talk about work without an audience. One audience member in particular.” Evelyn gave Dorian a pointed look. “How are things in legal Josie, anything juicy at the moment?” Evelyn asked, trying to change the subject.

“Tedious yes, juicy no. People insist on dragging out negotiations when they should know they are already beaten.”

“Excuse me, more to the point, are you suggesting that Cullen does not _like_ me? _Me_?” Dorian said with outrage.

“Dorian, you are a very smart man: is that so difficult to conceptualise? You don’t like him so why shouldn’t he not like you in return?” Evelyn replied.

“How dare he? That is very different! I am not a fastidious, onerous, stick-in-the-mud like he is. There is _nothing_ to dislike about me!”

“I am going to leave you two to your squabbling,” Josephine said, backing away with amusement twinkling in her eyes. “See you later. Let me know if you get sued.”

Dorian immediately rounded on Evelyn. “Secrets? Between us?”

“It was nothing,” Evelyn said trying to sound firm and convincing. She overplayed it and Dorian scoffed in disbelief.

“All of a sudden you don’t trust me to be discrete? Me?” Dorian asked with a haughtiness that very nearly concealed the genuine hurt beneath it.

Evelyn felt a pang of guilt. Dorian had been quick to trust her after they met, and though she had never had a properly interesting secret, she had not hesitated to divulge him of any details of her life in the past. She could understand his resentment at her sudden stonewalling. “It _was_ nothing. Boring accountant talk like you said. Numbers and stuff. You would be happier not hearing it trust me.”

“Cullen loves numbers so I find it extremely unlikely he would have looked that agitated on approach if all he wanted to do was talk about them. But fine, you international woman of mystery. I will leave the matter be.”

“Thank you.”

“For now.” Evelyn rolled her eyes as Dorian likely guessed though he could not see her face. “End of week celebratory drinkies Friday after work? Josephine already agreed.”

“I can’t on Friday.” Dorian guffawed loudly. “Whatever conclusion you have jumped to it is wrong,” Evelyn added quickly.

“What can I do except jump to conclusions if you refuse to enlighten me with the truth?” There was a long pause where Dorian waited for Evelyn to crack and she stubbornly ignored him. Instead, she began to type an email, hammering her keyboard with unnecessary force. “Such loyalty to him all of a sudden! What has he got on you? Nudes?” Dorian whispered in delighted speculation.

Evelyn sent her email with a violent click of the mouse. It pinged in Dorian’s inbox a second later.

_“Shut up I am trying to work.”_

A loud “Fine!” and a huff came from opposite her that made several people in the office turn around. Evelyn ignored them and Dorian, and when everyone had settled back to work, she quickly navigated her way back to the photos from the end of year party. To one photo in particular.

Biting her lip, she squinted at it for a while: their faces close, Cullen’s eyes on hers with the tiniest of smiles playing on his lips while she laughed unrestrained, arm wrapped around his.

Self-conscious, and concerned that should someone walk by her desk and see her studying the image she quickly closed it.

How in Thedas had his sister gotten _that_ impression?

No, Evelyn didn’t think they looked like a couple at all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alternative title: 'I Like Big Tropes and I Cannot Lie'. But seriously.  
> Thanks for reading!


	2. Ruse

It was already Friday. Evelyn had not intended to leave catching up with Cullen this late but work had gotten the best of her (as it often seemed to). Today there was a merciful reprieve in urgent tasks which was fortunate as their ‘date’ was that night and Evelyn still barely knew Cullen from a bar of soap.

She heard voices as she approached Cullen’s office. With her hands full, she knocked on the open door with her elbow as best she could and called out a greeting. “Am I interrupting? Hi Cassandra, I would have brought you a coffee had I known I would see you.”

“Hello Evelyn,” Cassandra said in that measured, terrifyingly regal voice of hers. Evelyn had always had a healthy amount of fear and respect for the woman and previous two-time winner of Employee of the Year. She had not realised that she and Cullen were friends but considering their work ethic and mutual dislike of folly, it made some sense.

“That is for me?” Cullen asked sounding surprised as Evelyn offloaded a coffee and two paper bags onto his desk.

“Yes. Sweet or savoury?” She pointed at the two bags.

“Sweet?” he answered perplexed.

“Interesting, I had you pegged as a savoury man.” She tore one of the bags to reveal a muffin: hers pumpkin and feta. His was raspberry and coconut, which he would discover, if he would stop eyeing the bag suspiciously and venture to touch it. She tore off a hunk of her own morning tea and offered the rest of the muffin to Cassandra.

“Ugh,” Cassandra said, wrinkling up her nose at the clearly repulsive prospect of a mid-morning baked good. “You two obviously have something to discuss. I should return to work. I will see you at the gym later Cullen. Goodbye Evelyn,” she threw over her shoulder as she strode out.

“I got you a long black, topped up. Is that okay?” Evelyn sat at the chair across from Cullen’s desk.

“Yes, how did you know?”

“I guessed. Now we don’t have a lot of time.” Evelyn burrowed in her purse for a moment and produced two sheafs of paper, handing one to Cullen. “These are some basic questions.”

“Questions?”

“The answers being things we would know about each other if we…” she trailed off as she got up and closed the door before resuming her seat opposite him and continuing: “if we were dating. We can fill it in and then swap to study.”

“Favourite fruit? Childhood fears? Places you have travelled? Crunchy or smooth?”

“All important things. I am trying to think about what might come up in conversation.”

“How often do you talk about your childhood fears in casual conversation?”

“Oh all the time! Don’t you? There was this man who ran the local ice-cream truck and I was convinced he was a child murderer for no apparent reason. I think it was his eyebrows, they were _incredibly_ menacing. But I wanted to get ice-cream so badly that it made every day of my life a terrible struggle of competing fear and desire. He was a nearly insurmountable obstacle and every sprinkle covered cone was a true triumph of human perseverance and courage.”

Cullen looked bewildered and unsure of how to respond, chose to ignore her. He continued to scan down the list. “Biggest pet peeve – just the one?”

“List more if there is space.”

“Would I rather eat a tin of dog food or a tin of cat food? Seriously Evelyn?” Cullen asked sounding unamused.

Undaunted by his scepticism, Evelyn explained: “It gives me an important insight into your psychology.” He pondered for a moment before writing something down. Evelyn craned to see his answer. “Cat food?”

“Yes. The tins are smaller. What insight does that give you?”

“That you are logical. I am going to write that too now.”

“Isn’t that cheating?”

“No, it is learning. See I am already growing as a person in this relationship,” Evelyn answered airily.

He rolled his eyes. “I’m sure.” He read on: “Siblings…” and scratched down an answer.

“Just Mia?”

“What is the point of me writing down answers if you are just going to keep asking me questions?”

“I need that to study. I can’t memorise all the important details about you in one sitting.”

“Important details like how I pronounce ‘gif’?”

Evelyn shuddered. “Well that is going to be a problem for a start.”

“Two sisters and a brother,” Cullen said, obviously keen to stop that particular argument before it got off the ground. Evelyn noticed the heavy-handed change in conversation but was too curious about Cullen’s family to object.

“Do they all live out of town?”

“Yes, but Branson only lives a couple of hours away. It is his wedding. That is, the purpose for Mia’s visit. Not this weekend, the next. Rosalie will arrive later.”

“That is so exciting! Congratulations to him!” Evelyn exclaimed with genuine delight.

“You won’t need to come,” Cullen quickly clarified. “I would never expect that of you. As part of this I mean.” He gestured at the questionnaire. “The seats are all full at any rate.”

“Shame, I love weddings,” Evelyn beamed at him until he let out an awkward laugh that clearly projected that he couldn’t tell if she was joking or not. “I take it you don’t?” she asked.

“I find them tedious.”

“But the food Cullen. The food.”

“Often mediocre. At best.”

“You must be the life of the party.”

“I don’t pretend to be something I am not.”

“No, you hide in a dark corridor outside of the party working on your phone instead.”

“Now you are making me sound like a complete recluse. I fulfil my social obligations.”

“You fulfil your… You endure them you mean.” Evelyn put a despairing hand over her face, peeking out at him from between two fingers.

“I am not antisocial. I just prefer small gatherings over…events. Big occasions,” he said firmly, frowning at her.

Evelyn immediately regretted mocking him on the matter. “Alright, fair enough. Don’t get hostile with me. I am just trying to get to know you, not judge you.”

“It sounds a lot like judging.”

Evelyn skimmed through her pages. “Question 46. My biggest character flaws?” She carefully sounded out the word as she wrote it: “Judgmental.”

Cullen followed suit, finding the same question and writing an answer. “Defensive,” he said, looking at her over the rims of his glasses and smiling.

Evelyn laughed. “So the wedding could be a big topic of conversation. We might have to go into that a little more. But that is lovely news, you family must be so happy, and your parents must be delighted.”

Cullen shook his head. “They would be.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“Better that you know. And yours?”

“Well, and holidaying in Antiva. They-,” Evelyn had been about to say they owned a property there. Truth be told they owned a property most postcard pretty destinations. In the past, she would have been with them but instead she was here, bringing them shame and shunning the family business by pursuing a career on her own terms. It was a point of contention to say the least. “They are probably enjoying the sun,” she finished instead.

Cullen gave her a quizzical look but was evidently not the kind of person who would pick at something someone clearly did not wish to talk about for which Evelyn was grateful. Instead he read the next question: “What is in my top desk drawer? That is just invasive.”

“Not it isn’t, it is a good question. It will tell me a lot about you; what you keep in close reach but just out of sight.”

“If it is out of sight then perhaps I would prefer to keep it that way.” Cullen said firmly. Intrigued, Evelyn stood up, half intending to rush the desk and try to force the drawer open but pre-empting her, Cullen reached to his left without looking up and Evelyn heard a key click.

“Maker have mercy, what _are_ you hiding in there?”

“Nothing I wish to disclose to you.”

 “No, you must tell me, it is part of the questionnaire.”

“I ‘must’ do no such thing. I am hardly beholden to your questionnaire.”

“But now I am dying of curiosity. Dying!” Cullen remained maddeningly silent, expression unaltered. “You could have just lied, you know. Instead of drawing my attention to it. You could have said it was your favourite pen. I would have believed you had a favourite pen.”

“ _That_ wouldn’t have gotten the same reaction out of you,” he said and Evelyn noticed a grin tugging at the corner of his lips. She sat down in a huff.

“There is nothing interesting squirreled away, is there? You are just riling me up,” she said, knowing full well she was right.

“That is for me to know and for you to never find out.”

“I am impressed. And irritated,” Evelyn admitted. It surprised her: she would have thought Cullen above teasing but now he sat across from her with a schoolboy look of smugness.

Then, his expression faltered and he looked at her seriously. “I actually do have a favourite pen…”

* * *

 

When evening arrived, and the date loomed, Evelyn only felt only marginally better prepared though she had been frantically studying Cullen’s questionnaire in the taxi to his apartment. A little anxious, she nonetheless possessed an overpowering sense of determination. Evelyn was not one to shy from a challenge and they could definitely pull this off.

She was 99.9% certain anyway.

Cullen must have been waiting for her to arrive when only a few seconds after she had rung the bell, he opened the door.

“Hello darling,” she beamed. “Thank you for the flowers, might you put them in water before they wilt?” He took the bouquet.

“That was nice of me. Interesting choice of purse for that dress,” he replied, letting her inside and eyeing her bulging duffle bag curiously.

“Criticising my outfit: real charming start,” she snapped at him as her heels clacked across the hardwood floor.

“You look lovely. Apart from the camping equipment.”

Dropping her bag on the floor at her feet she took a moment to survey his apartment. It was large, much larger than her own, but felt positively cozy and Evelyn’s eyes skimmed from the antique dining table to the worn looking velvet sofa and Persian rug in deeps shades of crimson and navy. Bookshelves lined the walls, spines packed tight while more books and papers lay strewn about, on the coffee table, sofa and dining table, as if discarded absentmindedly. One even lay pages open, face down next to the kettle. These details and the warm lighting provided by several lamps gave the whole place a feel of a university library or an old, second hand bookstore.

“Wow. This is so different from what I pictured. So homey.”

“What exactly were you imagining?”

“I am not sure. Something minimalistic. Gun metal grey and concrete…”

“You were picturing me living in a shed?” Cullen asked. Evelyn couldn’t tell if he was amused or offended.

“Not exactly. That looks suspiciously like you have been working at home,” Evelyn said pointing at a spread of paperwork at one end of the dining table.

“I have,” Cullen answered simply. They stared at each other for a moment. Cullen was wearing effectively what he wore to work each day: a dress shirt and tailored trousers, with well-polished chestnut brown shoes. Only his sleeves were rolled up and he lacked a tie which Evelyn expected was his idea of going extremely casual. She had chosen a dark, forest green dress with cap sleeves and knee length skirt which she hoped would be sufficiently smart for wherever they were going.

“I meant it,” Cullen said.

“What?”

“You do look lovely.”

Evelyn blinked. “You…should do something with those flowers, I think they are dripping.”

Cullen busied himself looking in cupboards for a vase while Evelyn unzipped the duffel bag. “Are you going to tell me what is in there?”

“A few final touches.” She withdrew the first item as he filled a large jar with water. “A makeup pouch.”

“You don’t need it,” he said gallantly.

“No, for your bathroom.”

“I don’t need it either?” Cullen replied sounding baffled.

Evelyn ignored him and withdrew the next item, a long plastic case. “A toothbrush.” And the next. “A hoodie. And a handful of bobby pins: a sure sign a woman is about.”

“Evelyn.” Cullen put the flowers on the table with a firm thunk. “Explain yourself.”

Evelyn artfully arranged the hoodie on the end of the sofa, as if it had been cast there without thought. A handful of bobby pins was then scattered over the coffee table, and a select few placed on the dining table near the vase. “Mia will be staying here: if she is half as smart as you –”

“Smarter,” Cullen interrupted automatically.

“Then she will expect to see evidence that I have been here once or twice. At least.”

"And as a general rule guests bring their own toothbrushes?”

“Well, if they think they might be staying the night.”

“Oh,” Cullen replied.

“I mean, unless you think we wouldn’t have. But frankly I feel a little offended if you don’t think –”

“It is fine! Do…whatever you think is best,” he waved his hands dismissively and lowered his face but not before Evelyn realised he was turning red.

“Okay then, but you’re not going to like it.” Cullen looked alarmed as she took a step towards him, eyes widening in an unasked question. She ran a thumb over her lower lip, then reached out and smudged the lipstick on his collar. “There. You were looking a little pristine.”

Cullen frowned, pulling at the edge of the fabric to examine the mark. “That is going to bother me all night.”

“Good thing you won’t have to look at it.”

“I’ll know it is there,” he grumbled, glancing up at her. “But I admire your attention to detail nonetheless.” Evelyn was about to respond when she heard her phone ringing. From the duffel bag, she withdrew her actual purse and then dug out her phone.

“Something important?” Cullen asked as she glared at the screen.

“No,” Evelyn rejected the call. From the first four digits, she could tell it was from one of the work landlines but the extension was not one she recognised. “Bathroom?” she asked.

“Through there,” he pointed her in the right direction.

Evelyn spread her belongings over the counter, her sprawl of bottles and tubes in direct contrast to Cullen’s small, and reasonably neat cluster of products inhabiting one corner of the counter. Taking the opportunity, she checked her face in the mirror, brushing away a few flakes of mascara under her eyes before checking that she hadn’t ruined her lipstick.

The doorbell rang. Evelyn felt a jolt of nerves and tried to remind herself she wasn’t actually meeting her partner’s family and that nothing was at stake. It did little to settle her suddenly churning stomach. After a deep breath, she returned to the main room.

Cullen was there, embracing a shorter woman with the same thick, blonde hair, a suitcase dangling from her hand. Evelyn noticed he had had the good sense to conceal the duffel bag somewhere before opening the door.

“It is good to see you,” Cullen said, releasing his sister and taking her suitcase. “Mia, this is Evelyn.”

“Evelyn, so nice to finally meet you,” she gushed. Evelyn was touched by the genuine warmth in her voice.

“And you too. I –” Evelyn was interrupted by her phone ringing again. She rushed to her bag, rejecting the call which was originating from the same number as previously. Mystified, she shook her head, turning the phone to silent. “I am sorry! Apparently someone at the office didn’t get the memo that it is the weekend. How was your flight?”

“Good! I slept mostly, so surprisingly restful. I must say those flowers are beautiful.”

“Cullen knows my taste so well, always so thoughtful,” Evelyn chirped. Cullen shot her a warning look that clearly said: ‘don’t lay it on too thick’.

“Shall we head straight to the restaurant?” Cullen asked.

Mia nodded excitedly. “To the restaurant, the quicker the better. I am starving. I will just freshen up a little.” Cullen took her suitcase and showed Mia to her room, returning a few moments later without her.

“So far so good,” Evelyn said quietly.

“Speak for yourself, my nerves are shot.”

“You’re not a natural liar, are you?”

“No,” Cullen replied firmly.

“Have faith, this will be over soon.” Evelyn reassured him. Cullen hummed in response.

At the restaurant, Mia was proving to be significantly more chatty than her brother which suited Evelyn just fine. Evelyn had planned to ask a lot of questions, to keep the conversation away from any potentially tricky blind spots that might otherwise catch her and Cullen out and so far it was working exceptionally well.

A waiter checked on their table, not for the first time but Mia and Evelyn were so caught up in their conversation, they were not ready to order.

“What are you thinking Evelyn?” Mia asked, once they had taken a few quiet moments to examine the menu.

“So many options! I am not sure. Have you made a decision?”

“Not quite yet. I am sure Cullen has though. He is not one to languish in the decision-making process,” Mia teased.

“I _have_ made a selection, if you must know, but I resent you making that sound like an insult.”

Mia scoffed, and turned in her seat towards Evelyn as if to exclude her brother from the conversation. “Cullen always knows precisely what he wants and then is absolutely resolute once he has made his decision. He was always impossible to sway as a child, it was infuriating.”

“He certainly can be stubborn,” Evelyn agreed while Cullen gave her a resentful glare. “But I like a man who knows his own mind.”

Mia looked pleased. “Although I do see you have changed you mind about one thing Cullen.”

“And what is that?” Cullen asked, just as a waiter came to the table.

“May I take your orders?” he asked, possibly for the fifth time, his smile growing strained and his patience thin.

“Um, a few moments longer please,” Evelyn asked and he left. She was so focusing on what she was saying and doing she had barely read the options. This was proving far more stressful than the times she had accompanied Dorian out whose rather infuriatingly old-fashioned family seemed to value silence in a woman.

“What have I changed my mind about?” Cullen asked again as Evelyn tried to focus on the menu.

“Your hair.”

“His hair?” Evelyn asked, immediately distracted from her task.

“Mia,” Cullen said in a warning tone.

“Obviously the difference is huge.”

“It is?” Evelyn asked, too curious to worry about blowing their cover.

“Personally, I think he looks rather suave like this although it is taking a little getting used to. Is it very labour intensive? You must have seen it, au natural so-to-speak Evelyn. Do you have a preference?”

“Well I –” An obnoxious buzzing, loud enough to be heard despite the phone being muted interrupted Evelyn once more. She gave Mia and Cullen an apologetic smile and looked at the screen. It was the same number from work.

“Perhaps you should take that. Considering how insistent they are being it might be important,” Cullen urged.

Mia nodded. “Go on, don’t mind us.”

Evelyn strode to the door and stepped outside, finally answering her phone. “Hello, Evelyn speaking,” she said, shivering slightly. It was a balmy night but the breeze was still chilly.

“Hi, it’s Jim.”

“Jim?” Evelyn asked, searching her memory.

“From the Accounting Department.” Unenlightened, Evelyn faked an ‘Ah’ of recognition. “I just wanted to go over a few things, with the last reports you submitted?”

“Jim, I am sure you can appreciate that it is a Friday night and frankly that is the last thing I want to do right now.”

At the other end of the phone, Jim audibly gulped. “I don’t think you understand, this could be very, very serious for you.”

“What?” Evelyn felt a thrill of panic course through her. “What’s wrong? What have I done?”

“It is just…a mess. A huge mess. This will look bad for you. The numbers. Bad. Serious trouble. Corruption. Fraud. Very bad.”

Evelyn let out a gasp of horror, her mind racing. She had never done anything fraudulent in her life! With the teensy exception of pretending to be Cullen’s partner – Cullen! Of course! She grasped at the thought of him like a life buoy. “No! Cullen looked over everything I sent on Thursday and said nothing, nothing at all! Wait just a moment Jim!  I am with him now; let me ask,” Evelyn had one foot on the front step of the restaurant when there was a sound of a struggle at the other end of the phone. “Jim?”

“I am sorry! They made me do it!” Jim yelled, clearly some distance from the receiver before yelping.

Was he being kidnapped? Evelyn wondered if she should call the police. “Jim!” she yelled. “Are you all right!?”

“Hello Evelyn,” said a new voice on the line, familiar and dripping with self-satisfaction.

Evelyn let out a series of curses that only made the recipient of her ire chuckle. By the raucous laughter in the background it seemed as if there was a group of them. “Hello Dorian and associates. How are those after work drinks going?” she asked irritably.

“I swore I would prove it to them! Didn’t I swear it?” he added, to someone in the room with him “Evelyn. Cullen. Out. Together. Simultaneously. In precisely the same location,” Dorian slurred slightly, a chorus of agreement coming from the people in the background.

He was clearly at least a little tipsy already which made him easier to forgive somehow, Evelyn thought with a tiny smile she was glad he could not see. “You are far too cunning for your own good. Honestly you nearly gave me a heart attack. I think you _did_ give Jim one.”

“Jim is a good sport and played his role to perfection. A future on the stage for sure, that one.”

“I am sure he appreciates your praise.” There were sounds of another struggle for the receiver.

“Evelyn, we do not wish to keep you from your evening.”

“Thank you Leliana.”

“And whatever delights it may entail.”

“Leliana don’t –” Evelyn began but the call was ended. They were all going to be nightmarish come Monday and Evelyn was already dreading it. She needed to warn Cullen, but obviously it would have to wait.

This was getting quickly out of hand.

Back at the table, Evelyn noted with confusion that the menus were gone. “I am so, so hungry,” Mia explained apologetically. “Sorry Evelyn, and plus I think the waiter was about to turn us out into the street. They have a reservation after us. Cullen ordered for you.”

“Oh, good thinking,” Evelyn said weakly as she took her seat.

“Is everything okay at the office?” Cullen asked.

“Yes. There was…a miscommunication but it has been resolved. For now,” she explained. Cullen looked at her questioningly but she gave her head a tiny shake. “We shouldn’t linger too much on work talk.”

“You both must find it difficult, to stay off the topic given you are colleagues.”

“Sometimes that feels like all we ever discuss,” Evelyn joked with a knowing glance across the table at Cullen before immediately returning to her strategy of asking questions to deflect. “As a social worker it must be difficult for you to switch off at the end of the day. You must have developed sound strategies for compartmentalising?” Mia nodded thoughtfully and leaned forward to answer while Evelyn let out a tiny sigh of relief at another conversation redirected. As she tried to focus on Mia’s response she wondered if Cullen was as tense as she was, and whether he regretted agreeing to let her help.

Probably, Evelyn figured. And he didn’t even know that the slightly inaccurate cat was out of the bag with their colleagues yet.

The conversation continued down the vein of destressing techniques and Mia and Evelyn were enthusiastically exchanging tips about meditation as Cullen looked increasingly stressed at the thought of it.

“So you just sit there, when you are already time poor, and think about how you are not getting done the things you should be getting done?”

“No,” Mia countered “It is about taking some time out for yourself, learning to prioritise your mental health for a period each day so that you can work more efficiently overall.”

“And you don’t sit there thinking about work. You let your mind wander, but also focus, beyond the superficial that is,” Evelyn explained while Mia nodded and Cullen looked between them with scepticism as if he thought he might be the victim of a prank.

It was at that moment that the waiter returned and with a terrible enthusiasm, plopped a hunk of dead cow in front of Evelyn. It took all her willpower to not recoil from the table.  

Mia’s voice faded into the background as Evelyn ran through different scenarios of how to immediately get out of her current dilemma. What if she knocked her plate to the floor and then insisted they not bring her another? Or planted a hair in it and claimed she had lost her appetite as a result? Faked a swoon?

Alternatively, she could take the candle and set the entire table alight. That would do it.

Cullen was looking at her. Not just looking at her: looking at her like she was having a nosebleed and he didn’t quite know how to break the news. Mia had stopped speaking and was watching her too. Their meals where half finished – how long had Evelyn been silent?

Cullen reached across the table and placed a hand over hers. “Evelyn?” he asked, brow wrinkling with genuine concern. “You look a little pale.”

“I think I zoned out there for a moment,” she explained and pulling her hand away, picked up her fork, stabbing a spear of asparagus from the edge of the plate.

In an obvious but considerate attempt to give them a moment, Mia excused herself for the bathroom. Evelyn watched her walk away. “What happened?” Cullen asked.

Evelyn slid her plate across the table with force. “I am estimating that you have approximately two minutes and thirty-eight seconds to eat this.”

“What? Why? No,” Cullen said each word in quick succession and with mounting dismay.

“I haven’t eaten meat in seven years!” Evelyn hissed. “Don’t talk – eat!” She made shovelling motions with her hands in his direction

“You didn’t tell me you were a vegetarian! This wasn’t in the list of questions!” he replied in a whisper so loud it defeated its own purpose.

“I didn’t think you would be ordering food for me, did I? Eat!”

“No,” Cullen started looking around the room. “We have to get rid of it.”

“Then the animal died for nothing!”

“It is in neither a position to argue, nor care.”

“Cullen!”

“Sorry I am just trying to think,” he gestured towards a waiter.

“No don’t get a waiter! They will ask questions or think it was cooked wrong and bring a fresh one. There isn’t time!”

“Then what? What!?”

“I don’t know!”

He shoved the plate back in her direction. “Put it in your purse!

 “No!” Evelyn shouted, repulsed at the idea as people began to stare.

“I’ll buy you a new one,” Cullen said, lowering his voice again.

“You ordered it: put it in your pocket!”

“Maker give me strength.” He ran his hand over his face before freezing, hand still covering his mouth. “Mia is coming,” he told her, voice muffled.

Evelyn glanced over her shoulder. Mia was on the opposite side of the room, standing aside politely to let a family file through a narrow gap. “I have an idea but you can never come back to this restaurant again.”

“Just do it,” Cullen answered. About two and a half metres away on Evelyn’s left there was a clear path to a potted plant. The surrounding diners had their backs turned, or were focused on their conversations and meals.

She chanced another glance at Mia who was still distracted. Disgusted, Evelyn pinched the edge of the steak and focused on the plant, the tip of her tongue sticking out the corner of her mouth with concentration. “I take it back! Don’t do it!” Cullen said quickly as he finally registered what she was planning.

Bending, Evelyn swung the steak low next to her chair then, when she gauged it had enough momentum, released. It somersaulted over the carpet and landed with a satisfying thwump at the base of the plant, disguised perfectly amongst the potting mix. Elated, Evelyn spun back in her chair to face Cullen. He looked shell-shocked. “I’m not just going to leave it there. I’ll tell them as we go. I’ll say it was an accident,” she reassured him.

“An accident,” he repeated disbelievingly.

“A freak wind. Or something.”

He gave her a long, expressionless stare. Evelyn blinked back at him, as innocently as she could manage. “That was a good throw,” he finally said, deadpan, voice so low it was nearly inaudible as Mia re-joined them.

“Evelyn,” Mia said, sounding surprised and gawking at her plate, “I thought I was hungry!”

“It came upon me, all of a sudden,” Evelyn said impassively, not breaking eye contact with Cullen as she stabbed another asparagus spear. He raised his water glass to his face, hand shaking, and over the rim she saw his eyes crinkle at the corners as he tried to conceal his laughter.

Evelyn let out a small snort that she turned into an unconvincing, full-blown coughing fit. Mia glanced between her two companions with a look of pleased bemusement, as if they were speaking in a secret language.

“Don’t mind me children,” she said breezily.

Cullen cleared his throat. “I think we should ask for a dessert menu.”

* * *

 

She was home, dress draped over a chair at the end of her bed, heels long discarded in her passage across the apartment. She felt tired, but her mind was still alert. Snug in her pyjamas, she had been meandering around, chewing on the edge of her thumb with distracted agitation, feeling like she should just give up and go to bed but somehow unable to get settled.

Retrieving her phone, Evelyn saw a series of messages. She had forgotten she had silenced it. There was a string of Dorian gloating by text message which she skimmed over without reading. A group photo of the rest of her friends captioned: _‘Hope you’re having fun. Not missing you - traitor’_ which made her laugh. Very mature. A few snaps from Sera of particularly lewd but entertaining graffiti that she may have either found or drawn herself.

And finally, a message from Cullen checking she got home safely and a concerned follow up half an hour later that she felt bad for not seeing earlier.

‘ _Fine. Sorry for late response. Didn’t hear phone.’_

_‘Thanks for…whatever that was.’_

_‘It could have gone better - sorry!’_

There was a long delay after which Evelyn decided he had gone to bed. Or just frankly had enough of her which was understandable too. He had certainly gotten more than he had bargained for, poor man.

 She switched off her bedside lamp and lay down, phone beside her pillow. A bad habit, but she felt too tired to move it further away. It buzzed a few moments later, the glow of the screen illuminating her otherwise darkened room.

_‘It went fine. Well even. I enjoyed it.’_

_‘Me too.’_ Evelyn wrote but she hesitated before sending it. It seemed so stark, like a declaration.  Though she wasn’t sure what of. Evelyn squirmed in bed for a moment, feeling strangely self-conscious like a teenager texting their crush. Finally, she tacked an inexplicable umbrella emoji onto the end of her message. That would confuse him, she decided. Switching off her phone to avoid being woken if Dorian and the others decided to make a night of it, she finally settled against her pillow. With the thought of Cullen seeing her message and immediately checking the weather forecast in complete befuddlement, Evelyn drifted off to sleep, a satisfied smile on her lips.


	3. Caprice

Her good mood lasted for the remainder of the weekend, even when the inevitable confrontation with Dorian took place over brunch on Sunday. Despite assuring Cullen she would keep their arrangement to herself, the interference of her friends on Friday night and Dorian’s insatiable curiosity meant that in his case at least, honesty was the best policy. Withholding information she was happy to attempt, but outright lying to him for any longer was just not sustainable.

The truth however, seemed harder to swallow for Dorian than the eggs on toast he was annihilating.

Between mouthfuls he mused: “I still don’t understand why he didn’t just ask you out on a proper date.”

Evelyn sighed. “Because there _was_ no date. It was like one of _our_ dates.”

Dorian gave her a sceptical look. “I am not convinced this isn’t some elaborate ruse to trick you into going out with him. Maybe his sister was in on it.”

“Do you really think he is capable of that level of subterfuge? Remember when Leliana asked him what he thought of the new letterheads and he said he hated them right to her face? Not exactly a master of subtlety.”

“I remember: ‘too fancy’.” Dorian let out a derisive snort.

“Besides, he isn’t interested.”

Dorian gave her another sceptical look and Evelyn could only roll her eyes. “You have an inflated opinion of me. One that the general population does not necessarily share.”

“Hmm,” he said and signalled the waiter for another coffee.

“Anyway, now you know so you can leave him alone.”

“‘Leave him alone’? What do you think I am planning on doing to him?” Dorian laughed.

“Leave _it_ alone! I meant just leave it alone! It is over and done with now so you can drop it,” she said with a little more fervour than she had intended but it appeared to have the desired effect and Dorian raised his hands in surrender.

“All right, I promise. I hope it was worth it: you missed a good night on Friday.”

“I could tell from the constant updates. I won’t miss the next one, I have learned my lesson.”

“And which lesson is that precisely? That accountants make terrible dinner companions?”

“No he was – yes, that was it,” Evelyn corrected herself quickly but Dorian’s entertained smirk indicated he had caught the defensive slip. “You promised to leave it alone,” Evelyn said, narrowing her eyes.

“I did indeed,” Dorian replied, still smirking and then, mercifully, changed the subject. “Was that progress meeting at 10:00 or 11:00 tomorrow?”

“Are you asking because you plan on sleeping in until the last possible moment? 10:00 then.”

“You can’t be trusted, I’ll message Varric.”

* * *

 

Evelyn arrived early to the office on Tuesday to try and clear up some of her backlog of emails before the first avalanche of new ones started for the day. Her floor was empty and she was deeply engrossed in her work when she thought sensed a presence behind her. Swivelling in her chair she almost fell out of it as the intern lurked at her back.

“Cole! You nearly gave me a heart attack!”

“Sorry. People keep saying I sneak up on them.”

Her initial shock abated, Evelyn smiled fondly at him. “You know you can take heavy footsteps, or clear your throat on approach or something. Tends to help with that. Can I do something for you?”

“No, nothing. I just knew you were in and brought these up from the mail room for you.” He placed a bundle of envelopes on her desk and then gently stroked a frond of the fern she kept there.

“Oh, thank you. That is very thoughtful. How has everything been going for you Cole?”

“You are happy.”

“The traditional response is ‘good and how are you?’ actually.”

“But you are.”

“Am I? I suppose I am happy enough.”

“He is too.”

“Dorian is always happy, except when he is morose but that is generally for dramatic effect.”

“Not Dorian.”

“Okay…” Evelyn never quite knew where Cole was coming from, he always seemed to be on a slightly different wavelength than the rest of humankind. She liked him: he was sensitive and perceptive, but talking to him could be extremely puzzling.

“This one needs a little water,” Cole gave the fern a final stroke before leaving. Evelyn watched him, half expecting him to disappear in a puff of smoke. When he did not, she took her water bottle a gave the fern a drink.

* * *

 

On Wednesday, an email from Cullen popped up in the right-hand corner of her screen.

_‘Are you free for a few minutes?’_

_‘Yes.’_

_‘Can you come to my office?’_

_‘You remember where my desk is.’_

_‘I don’t like the way Dorian looks at me.’_

_‘How precisely does he look at you that leaves you so unnerved?’_

_‘This week? Like a mother bear watching a predator encroach on her cub.’_

Evelyn couldn’t deny that and with a sigh, rose to her feet, stretching her arms over head. Secretly she was pleased for an excuse for a walk.

“My usual coffee please, and a danish if they have any apricot left. No blueberry. Vile abominations,” Dorian said.

“I’m not on a coffee run. Sorry to disappoint,” Evelyn told him.

“Then where are you - Oh. _Oh,_ I see. Well, don’t let me keep you then.” He gave her an exaggerated wink and Evelyn retorted by poking her tongue out.

As she weaved through the desks towards the lift, Vivienne stopped her. “I believe you dropped these,” she said with practiced languor that disguised a mind as sharp as a knife. She offered Evelyn a sheaf of papers.

“Thanks Vivienne, but they definitely aren’t mine.”

“No, believe me: they are,” Vivienne responded with a firmness that allowed for no argument.

“Alright…” Evelyn accepted the documents and gulped audibly as she read the heading: ‘IIV. SKY HOLDINGS HUMAN RESOURCES DEPARTMENT: RELATIONSHIPS IN THE WORKPLACE POLICY.’

“You have too much promise to fall foul of bureaucracy dear. I just want to make sure you take care of your prospects here.”

“Thank you,” Evelyn answered with sincerity, though she felt a little rattled. From anyone else this might have been a threat, but she and Vivienne had a mutual respect that allowed Evelyn to understand that the woman simply hated to witness wasted potential. Vivienne tilted her head aristocratically in the slightest of nods and sashayed off.

“You look like you have seen a ghost,” Cullen greeted her as she arrived at his office without further interceptions by well-meaning colleagues.

“People. More people. May know. Or think they know. About us.”

“Yes, my department bought me a ‘Congratulations on the date’ cake on Monday.”

Evelyn laughed but stopped abruptly when she saw Cullen wasn’t smiling. “Oh, I thought you were joking.”

“It was quite nice. The cake. Not the gesture.”

“Good,” Evelyn said, crossing and uncrossing her arms awkwardly, suddenly not quite sure what to do with them.

“Mia and I are going sightseeing this afternoon. She asked if you could come and was surprised I couldn’t answer on your behalf. Said we seemed the ‘calendar sharing’ type.”

Evelyn ignored that last part. “Oh no, I shouldn’t.”

“She would like you to. Insisted I ask. Hasn’t really stopped insisting actually.”

Evelyn was finding it impossible to get a read on his expression. Mia wanted her there, but did he? “No, I really shouldn’t impose on your time with your family. Please make my excuses. Tell her I would love to but…” she scrambled for a suitable excuse, “I am feeling a bit under the weather. That should do it.”

Cullen let out a sigh that Evelyn assumed was relief but almost sounded like disappointment. “I will.”

* * *

 

That night, Evelyn was absent-mindedly jiggling a teabag in her mug, wondering what sight Mia and Cullen were currently seeing when she received a text message from the man in question.

_‘I need your address.’_

_‘Excuse me?’_

_‘May I please have your address.’_

_‘You sound awfully worked up.’_

_‘Address?’_

Evelyn ignored it. He was going to have to explain himself as she had no intention of following the text message equivalent of a barked order.

A few minutes later he tried again. _‘Sorry that was abrupt. I made you soup. May I please bring it to you?’_

Evelyn quickly typed in her address. He had made her what? She wondered if the word ‘soup’ was typo but no other words seemed to fill the gap with a more rational explanation.  She conceded that maybe there was more to whatever this was than could be effectively explained by text message.

With no time to waste she rushed to her bathroom. Her hair desperately needed a brush, and the old makeup of the day either needed fixing, or complete removal. She should change too, something less slouchy, and check for anything that needed tidying around the apartment.

But as Evelyn examined herself in the mirror, she realised her flurry of activity felt uncomfortably close to the kind of preparations she would rush to make if an actual boyfriend was dropping by unexpectedly. It shouldn’t matter in this case. It _didn’t_ matter. Cullen had no expectations of her and she certainly had no reason to try and impress him. She did wash her face, and go so far as to tie her hair back, but remained defiantly comfortable in the track pants and oversized jumper she was already wearing.

Frankly she hoped her casual look made a statement to Cullen: an ‘I am not intimidated by the fact that you clearly know how to iron things properly even though that particular skill eludes me’ statement.

“Soup?” she asked when she opened the door to his knock.

“Soup,” he offered with resignation, the picture of a man defeated.

“You had better come in.” She held the door open wider.

“Don’t worry it is vegetarian. Vegan actually – just to be safe. I didn’t want to assume. Again.” He placed the tea towel wrapped container on her counter and started peering around her apartment.

“That was very considerate of you,” Evelyn replied tersely.

Cullen seemed distracted, glancing between her windows with a look of focused concentration like he was working on a maths problem. Finally he said: “This apartment is north-facing.”

“Is it?”

“You must freeze in the winter.”

“I’m not dead yet.”

Perhaps sensing he had misspoken Cullen blundered into a new, equally condescending topic. “You find IKEA furniture to be adequate?”

“Yes. Quite adequate enough.” Evelyn looked about herself and tried to see her apartment through Cullen’s eyes. It was perfectly comfortable in her opinion: simple, bright and neat. Yes, flat pack furniture dominated the combined kitchen and living area, but she compensated with great multitudes of pastel coloured cushions and throw rugs. Many surfaces were furnished with pot plants, a varied multitude of ferns and succulents. Larger pots were tucked in the corners and featured a fiddle leaf fig, snake plant and elephant ear, all thriving and well-tended. Moving around different rentals as much as she had since arriving in the city meant that she collected easy to move keepsakes, not heavy furniture, but still: she could never live without some greenery. “It all serves the purpose. I didn’t know how long I would be staying when I moved in.”

“Did you build it all yourself?” Cullen asked, still looking around and leaning slightly on the back of a dining chair as if to test if it would hold his weight.

“Yes, and don’t mention the bookshelf. That was a miscalculation but I assure you it is perfectly functional. I think it gives it character.” Cullen clearly hadn’t noticed the slightly askew bookshelf yet and now that he had, tilted his head in confusion but prudently, took her advice and said nothing on the topic.

“And the plants?” he asked.

“They are good for the air quality. Look, I didn’t barge into your apartment in the middle of the night and start criticising your musty ninety-year old Oxford scholar aesthetic,” Evelyn snapped, tired of defending herself in her own home.

Cullen immediately looked at his watch as if he was about to contest that it was not the middle of the night but thought better of it.  “You are right: that was discourteous of me and I apologise. I am sorry to intrude.” He sighed, then by way of explanation, added: “I painted myself into a corner with Mia.”

“Did the sightseeing go well?”

“Not particularly,” Cullen said drily. “Mia kept worrying and asking if there were any updates about your condition and barely paid attention to half of it. Then she began to grow increasingly frustrated at my apparent lack of concern for you.”

“So you made me some soup. Lovely.”

“I improvised. Not one of my talents. This is…getting a little out of control. If you want to back out of it I would understand completely. This has gone far beyond a favour already.”

Evelyn wasn’t certain if he was trying to offer her an escape route, or trying to establish one for himself. “The end is in sight and you are thinking about quitting? Come on, we have made it this far: surely the worst is over. Don’t lose your resolve on my behalf: I hate leaving a job half done.”

“That is one way of putting it. Sorry again, for disturbing you. I should leave you in peace.”

“Shouldn’t you stay a while? Mia is hardly going to be satisfied if you just throw the soup at my door and speed off again.”

“I do not want to impose any further.”

“What are you going to do? Sit on a bench in the rain for two hours and then go home?” Cullen looked as if he was considering it as a valid option and Evelyn sighed. “You may as well stay here, if you can trust the sofa enough to sit down on it.”

* * *

 

One bowl of surprisingly palatable soup, half a packet of biscuits and approximately three and half episodes of ‘Escape to the Country’ later, Evelyn turned to Cullen to speak and caught herself when she saw that he was nodding off. Still sitting upright, but with a growing slouch, chin on his chest and eyes closed, he looked seconds from deep sleep. Evelyn put her hand to her mouth to stifle a giggle and quickly quashed an urge to take a photo (Sera was obviously a bad influence on her).

The effect was ruined a moment later when Cullen’s phone chimed and startled him awake, blinking owlishly.

He looked at her in confusion. “What time is it?”

“About five minutes since we were complaining that these two didn’t like the second house even though it had a spiral staircase. A spiral staircase for goodness sake! Who cares that the toilet is outdoors? And then I just lost you for a second there.”

“I don’t recall that. It does not sound practical in the slightest. What about in winter? And a spiral staircase when they are hoping to live out their retirement in it? Sounds like a death trap.”

“No, you loved it: trust me. You may have been asleep already _technically_ but I still got that vibe from you. Guess the flat pack furniture isn’t too uncomfortable after all.”

“I was up early,” he explained defensively.

“You don’t need to tell me – I see the timestamps on your emails so I know you start work at about 4:00am.”

“You exaggerate,” he said, looking at his phone.

“Barely,” Evelyn replied quickly. Cullen’s eyes skimmed the message and he let out a groan. “What’s wrong?” Evelyn asked, alarmed.

“Mia has deduced from my lengthy absence that you must be quite seriously ill and is suggesting in strongly worded terms that I not return home on her account and stay to monitor your condition. She refuses to have you suffer needlessly and alone on her account.”

Relieved it was nothing more serious, Evelyn let out a breathy laugh of exasperation. “You’re right this is snowballing a bit out of hand. Who knew that lying to your siblings would get so complicated?”

“I am starting to feel terrible about this. Lying to her. Maker, I didn’t know she was actually going to like you so much.”

“Thanks,” Evelyn said, drawing out the ‘s’.

“You know what I mean.”

“This was all to make her happy remember?” Evelyn said. At least, she thought that was what it had been about but as it was, she was beginning to lose track. “What are you looking at?” Cullen was scrolling through his phone with unnecessary, agitated force.

“I am looking for a nearby hotel.”

“Oh don’t be ridiculous. If you aren’t going home then stay here.”

“No,” he answered bluntly.

“Why not? You obviously don’t mind the sofa so sleep on it.”

“I wouldn’t want to make you feel uncomfortable.”

“If there was a risk of that I wouldn’t have offered. Come on it is late. Don’t be ridiculous. You were sleeping just fine a minute ago.” Cullen looked at her in exasperation, probably grasping for an excuse that would not come. Evelyn rose and began to arrange the blankets for him. “Come on it is _raining_ and you made soup for me when I was ill so I already owe you one.”

“But you are not ill.”

“Trust an accountant to get caught up in the details.” She fluffed a cushion at the end of the sofa. “Do you want to borrow pyjamas? I have sheep ones or cupcake ones.”

“Obviously not.”

“Goodnight then! Sleep tight, see you in the morning.” She moseyed into her bedroom and shut the door on his astonished face, listening for a moment, half expecting to hear him making a break for the exit. But he did not, which felt like a victory somehow. Though a large part of her brain was asking her what on earth she was playing at. Had she even thought this through? Inviting a man she barely knew to spend the night? Not in that way – Maker, Dorian would have a field day: he must never know. But even this was so unlike her. She flopped down on her bed face first.

How overfamiliar and eccentric she must seem to Cullen. Evelyn buried her face into her pillow so that she could groan. The problem was she kept forgetting that they barely knew each other. There was something so natural about having him around, awkward though he could be, patronising though he often was…And somehow that encouraged her to act like a fool in front of him? What confused her more was why she even cared what he thought of her all of a sudden? After this surely they would resume their professional detachment in which they never spoke face-to-face and he could go back to silently judging her and upholding his end of the bargain by keeping her accounts straight.

Though agitated by this notion for reasons beyond her, Evelyn’s consternation did not last and she fell easily into an untroubled sleep.

For a time at least.

The shout and subsequent crash that had woken Evelyn must certainly be attributed to the presence of a burglar in her apartment. Or a serial killer. Or a person of other, general ill-intent. At least that is what Evelyn’s brain rationalised as she lay frozen in bed, rigid and temporarily paralysed with fear. Right up until the point that she remembered she had left her colleague sleeping in her living room and padded out to see what was going on, wrapping her arms around herself nervously.

Upon flicking on the light there was rapid movement. Cullen braced himself against the wall with one hand and covered his eyes with the other. A shattered pot revealed itself to be the source of the crashing noise, dirt across the floor like a firework and an unfortunate succulent with exposed roots on her rug.

“What happened?” Evelyn asked, though it seemed fairly obvious. Blundering around in the dark in an unfamiliar location didn’t usually end well.

“I was trying to get a glass of water.” Each word was measured and came slowly, as if it cost him much to first think, then say them.

“It looks like you were unsuccessful.”

“It’s bright,” Cullen said weakly.

“Generally lights help people find where things are,” Evelyn replied but seeing him not moving to uncover his eyes she quickly switched the light off again. She blinked and stayed huddled in the door frame, trying to adjust her vision back to the semidarkness. Soon after, she heard Cullen sit heavily back on the couch and let out a long breath. “Are you all right?” Once again, obviously he wasn’t, but she was at a loss of what else to say.

“Headache.”

“That seems like an understatement,” she muttered and he did not respond. Confident that she at least did know her way around the apartment even in the dark, she retrieved the water for him, and passed the glass into his hand with a packet of painkillers, the shadows not quite hiding his tremor. It was silent, until Evelyn took the empty glass from him and placed it on the coffee table. “What can I do for you?”

“Nothing.” He rested his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands.

If Evelyn was not quite so worried she might have laughed at how much like a surly teenager he sounded in that moment. She sat down beside him, the sofa sinking in the middle so their legs touched. “There must be something.” He remained hunched over and unmoving, face hidden. Growing more concerned, she placed a tentative hand on his back. It felt cold, even through his shirt and instinctively, she rubbed it for a minute, before reaching to drape a blanket over him but he made no indication he had even noticed.

They sat like that for a long time until feeling a pressing need to do something Evelyn stood up. “Did you take the painkillers? You should lie down.”

“Yes,” he answered, following her instructions and stretching out on the sofa. Evelyn chewed her bottom lip: he was as weak as a kitten. What kind of headache did this to a person?

In the dark and as quietly as possible, she retrieved her dust pan and brush and cleaned up most of the dirt from her fallen plant, folding the rest up in the rug and moving it to one side to be dealt with in daylight. The succulent itself she carefully salvaged. They were hardy plants and it could probably be saved if given a new home.

Then, she refilled Cullen’s water glass and left it within his reach before pulling another blanket over him. His eyes were closed but she had no idea whether he was actually asleep or not.

There was nothing left to be done and Evelyn knew she should probably return to bed and try to sleep too. But she didn’t, settling herself into an armchair opposite the sofa she took the rug from the arm rest and arranged it over her knees. She folded her arms and gave Cullen’s form a long, analytical look, watching carefully to double check he was still breathing. He seemed unlikely to be dead it was true, but concern coupled with the slow tapering off of her adrenaline rush from being woken was making her irrational.

Eventually, Evelyn managed to doze fitfully for a couple of hours but stirred to find Cullen unmoved, the glass of water untouched. She waited.

The first light of dawn was painting her walls rosy when Cullen opened his eyes. He sat up, slowly, cautiously and gave her a long, level look, the clarity in his eyes assuring Evelyn that the worst pain of last night had finally passed.

“You’re back,” she said simply.

“In a manner of speaking,” he replied. His voice was hoarse and Evelyn automatically moved to put the kettle on. “This is embarrassing,” he rasped, reaching for the glass of water and gulping it down gratefully.

“It was nothing,” Evelyn said casually as she got up, stretching her aching legs, held in the same position for far too long before walking into the kitchen.

“Hardly.”

“No really,” Evelyn threw over her shoulder. She had her back to him, tending to the kettle and coffee things. “Some of the situations I have found Sera in after a night out would truly make you shudder.”

Cullen ignored her diversion. “I seem to be exceptionally good at making a fool of myself in front of you,” he sounded dejected.

“I don’t see it that way.”

“You’re being generous.”

“Do you know what that was? What caused it?”

“A headache.”

“Of course you have to be an overachiever about headaches too. Have to do it better than everyone else.” He did not react to her teasing. “Has that happened before?”

“They come and go.”

“You get these often?” Evelyn spun around, suddenly irritated, an emotion exacerbated by both her concern and lack of sleep. “Cullen! Tell me at least you are seeing someone about them?”

Cullen looked surprised at her sudden anger and shrugged. “It is not worth the trouble.”

“The _trouble_?” Evelyn spluttered out the word before catching herself, and forcing herself to calm down before speaking again. “We have this incredible thing called modern medicine. You could have scans done, or something. I don’t know, I am not a doctor but there must be something they can do.”

“I appreciate your concern but it is unnecessary.”

Evelyn gave him an exasperated look. “I didn’t really have a choice but to be concerned. I thought I was going to have a corpse in my apartment.”

Cullen narrowed his eyes with scepticism. “It was just a headache.”

“That was not normal, not a normal headache. And you have no idea what triggered it? Something you ate? Have you hit your head recently? Some kind of stress?” Cullen’s sudden stricken look told Evelyn she had hit home with her last suggestion and her stomach sank. “Maker, it isn’t _this_ is it? Our fake relationship didn’t do that to you did it? I had no idea it was causing you so much worry.”

“No! No, of course it isn’t that.”

“Then what is stressing you out so much?” Evelyn probed. Cullen shook his head. “I heard a yell, before you knocked over the plant,” she prompted.

There was a pause long enough to make Evelyn question whether she had dreamt hearing the shout. “I had a nightmare,” Cullen finally admitted, perhaps sensing there was no escape.

“Are they frequent too?”

“Somewhat.” It was barely more than a whisper. He looked exhausted, and still so weak, a shell of his usual self with pallid skin and alarmingly distinct shadows under his eyes. It made all of his features look sharper, harsher somehow.

The kettle clicked off and Evelyn turned away. Suddenly she did not wish to pursue this line of questioning further. It felt like she was taking advantage of him and the vulnerable state he was currently in. His guard was down, but for all the wrong reasons. If it wasn’t the kind of thing he wanted to talk about when he was more himself, she did not wish to press him now. “You don’t owe me an explanation, we don’t have to talk about it,” she said, without turning around but somehow, she sensed relief from him and the atmosphere of the room seemed to lighten.

Evelyn poured boiling water into the coffee plunger, swilled it around to warm the glass and tipped it out. She added the coffee grounds, and when the rest of the water had cooled from boiling, tipped it in to steep. The routine, the sounds and the first smell of coffee wafting into her face in a cloud of steam were soothing.

When it was brewed, she poured them both a mug and returned to her armchair, handing Cullen his drink which he accepted gratefully.

“Thank you,” he said upon receiving it, but with a gratitude that was clearly more broadly intended.

“You are not accustomed to opening up around people are you.”

“Opening up around people tends to lead to situations like this.”

“Specifically like this? Elaborate schemes, soup of lies and a succulent casualty”

“Not specifically no.” Evelyn was relieved to see a small smile from him. “Mia is leaving today, to join Branson and help with the wedding preparations.”

“You aren’t going to help too?”

“No, I’ll drive out on the day of the wedding. Apparently I lack the necessary expertise with a hot glue gun to be of any help. I was also told I possess an apparently infuriating tendency to respond with ‘it looks fine’ when asked an opinion on anything.”

Evelyn rolled her eyes. “That is never the right answer. Never.”

“This I cannot begin to comprehend. How can giving my opinion be the wrong answer to being asked my opinion?”

“A more correct response would be ‘That is fantastic!’. Or, if you hate it: ‘That is fantastic but maybe…’”

“The subtle particularities of wedding decorations elude me at any rate. I would rather leave it in the hands of those more capable.”

“A wise stance to take.”

Despite all that had happened, and despite the unusual and false pretences that had resulted in Cullen sitting in her living room at dawn with a cup of coffee, Evelyn still fought to feel a sense of peculiarity. These were the most odd of circumstances and yet, she felt a distinct absence of discomfort. Her sleep deprived brain still seemed convinced that this was normal.

It was this self-reflection that finally allowed a confused seed of panic to set in.

Evelyn wondered if something in her expression or posture had given away her change in mood, or if Cullen had been following a similar thought process as he quickly drained his coffee and left for the bathroom. When he returned, he had made an obvious attempt at scrubbing his face to try and freshen up which only had the effect of making him look more dishevelled and tired.

Part of her wanted to hug him and part of her wanted to shove him out the door.

“I should go,” he said.

“You don’t want anything to eat or…” Evelyn did not quite know what else could possibly be of help in this situation.

“No, I truly have imposed too much already. Thank you for your hospitality.”

The awkwardness had returned in full force and it was suffocating. “You are welcome. Though I don’t usually try to inflict excruciating pain on my guests. Usually.”

“You didn’t inflict…It was bad timing.”

“I don’t think there is _good_ timing for whatever that was,” Evelyn quickly countered. Cullen’s shoulders were rigid, his jaw set in place. He definitely did not want to talk about it, Evelyn realised, and probably he wished she had not born witness to something obviously personal. He did seem the type, to find a show of weakness humiliating. “Thanks for the soup. Say ‘hi’ to Mia for me and thank her for her concern.” It was a dismissal, and a show of mercy.

He left hastily, after responding with a nod and briefly checking he had his phone and keys, closing the door more behind him more loudly than he had probably intended.

Evelyn stood in place, dishevelled and uneasy. A one-night stand definitely would have been less confusing than this.


	4. Allied

Evelyn vigorously scrubbed her face with a damp flannel then blinked at her own dishevelled appearance in the mirror. It had been an eventful night and it was clearly going to take more than a splash of cold water to make her look human again.

Despite her lack of sleep and an enduring feeling of what Evelyn could only describe as ‘blah’, it was a work day. After showering, she felt marginally better, and all the routine steps of getting ready - buttoning up her cardigan, packing her purse, an ambitious swipe of lipstick, downing another mug of coffee and piece of toast - all took her mind off the strange encounter. Somewhat.

Nonetheless, her mind began to wander again during her commute and by the time she neared the office it was tumultuous once more. She disliked the uncomfortable note she and Cullen had parted on. In a practical context, it would make it harder for her to ask favours of him if there was some awkwardness between them.

But it was more than that, though Evelyn tried to deny it to herself. She was worried about him, and kept agonising over how mortified she suspected he must feel. Though she told herself it was not her responsibility to try and make him feel better (she wasn’t even exactly sure how she could make him feel better) she still felt a pressing need to try.

With this in mind, she detoured just before arriving at the office and bough three coffees and another muffin – it still agitated her that he had not eaten anything. Ten minutes later, she found herself knocking on his office door with extreme trepidation which was ultimately a waste of energy when it turned out he wasn’t there. His light was off but his door was unlocked. If he wasn’t in yet he likely would not be far away so she left the coffee and muffin on his desk, figuring he would correctly guess their origin and hopefully interpret them as the peace gestures they were intended to be.

Finally making it to her own desk, she passed one of the other coffees to Dorian who looked about it in an exaggerated fashion, even lifting up the cup to examine its underside, before asking “What? Still no danish?”

“You’re so needy.”

“I am just relieved to see you. How often am I at work before you? I was about to file a missing person report. Where have you been?”

“Out scouring every coffee shop in the city for a blueberry danish, just for you,” she teased, knowing his hatred of those particular pastries.

“Hmm, suspicious. A late start for the Punctuality Queen _and_ your boyfriend was just sniffing around your desk like a lost hound seeking its master.”

“Cullen was here?” Evelyn asked, falling straight into Dorian’s trap.

“So you admit it! Ah ha!”

“Very funny. I have neither the strength nor the willingness to engage with your superior wit right now,” Evelyn said, yawning, before nonchalantly taking a sip of coffee.

“You didn’t sleep with him, did you?” Dorian asked in a mercifully quiet voice.

“No. I did not,” Evelyn replied coldly. Any more of a reaction would be giving Dorian exactly what he wanted. “You know I didn’t. Don’t be ridiculous. And don’t make me regret confiding in you.”

“Alright, alright. I just thought maybe you had both colluded to make it…extra convincing.”

“Extra convincing? For the benefit of whom?” Evelyn said, then immediately regretted asking.

“I think it would probably benefit him. Might make him relax for the first time in a decade.”

“It thought you didn’t like him. Now you seem to be…”

“Seem to be what?” Dorian asked innocently.

“Goading us on. But there _is_ nothing to goad on.”

“You just keep telling yourself –,” he cut himself off when Evelyn’s work landline began to ring. “Speak of the devil.”

“It’s not him. Stop assuming that everything that happens to me is a part of some grand narrative of your choosing,” Evelyn told him, glancing at the phone and not recognising the incoming number. “Hello, Evelyn speaking,” she said, answering it, throwing Dorian a final glare before sitting down.

“Evelyn, it’s Mia. I don’t have your mobile number but the office switchboard put me through to your desk. I hope that is okay!”

“Yes, fine. Absolutely fine,” Evelyn said in a breathless, flustered way that no doubt had already piqued Dorian’s interest.

“I hope you are feeling much better? We missed you yesterday.”

“Great. Yes, I am doing great. Great. Much better.” More coherent sentences were eluding Evelyn. Lying was more fun when you had had time to prepare.

“Good, I am so glad. Look, I was really hoping to talk to you yesterday in person. I didn’t want Cullen to pass on the message and butcher it, make it sound all horrible and unwelcoming so I haven’t spoken to him yet either.”

“Oh, okay.”

“The thing is, we have just found out one of the guests has had to pull out of attending Branson’s wedding last minute. We would love for you to take the free place. The seating plan was _so_ tight, or else you would have been invited sooner but this just seems like it was meant to be and we would all love to have you there. Branson and Rosalie are desperate to meet you and obviously Cullen would want you there too, even if he hardly wants to be there himself!” Mia let out a tinkling peel of laughter. Evelyn joined in weakly. Obviously she strongly disagreed with the notion that Cullen would want her tagging along but what could she say?

“I don’t know, it doesn’t seem right. I don’t want to mess up the plans,” Evelyn replied. It sounded unconvincing, even to her own ears.

“Oh please don’t try and be polite! You would be doing us a favour truly and it just feels so right. I can’t express how happy we are for you and Cullen. Please, we are desperate to get to know you better. I know it is short notice but it would mean a lot to us all.”

“Wow Mia, I…Thank you. I will…Yes, of course I would love to come.” She had said ‘yes’? Then again what could she possibly say _but_ ‘yes’ when it was put to her like that?

“Perfect!” Mia sounded genuinely elated and Evelyn felt like a bag of steaming trash in the face Cullen’s sister’s kindness and geniality.  “I’ll see you again on Saturday! I’ll call Cullen and let him know the good news.”

Evelyn put the receiver down, stomach leaden with dread. Dorian whispered, peering at her from around her monitor: “Mia? Wasn’t that the name of Cullen’s sister?”

“Don’t talk to me,” Evelyn said and lay her face down on her desk.

* * *

 

Finally, inevitably, having heard the news from Mia himself, Cullen called her. Evelyn snatched up her mobile and rushed to the relative privacy of the kitchen, cowering between the end of the bench and the watercooler, keeping a watchful eye on the doorway for any eavesdroppers.

“I didn’t mean to accept: I was railroaded into it,” Evelyn said quickly, as soon as she had accepted the call.

“I know. I know what she is like,” he assured her.

“I’m so sorry. It’s not too late to make up an excuse. I could…fake my own death for example.”

“No. You don’t need to do that. You are welcome to come.”

Evelyn was silent for a long moment. “I am?”

“Only if you would like to. Or rather, if you don’t mind the waste of a Saturday.”

“No, it’s not a waste. I thought…I just thought you wouldn’t want me to.”

“I do want you to.”

“You do?” Evelyn asked incredulously.

“Only if you want to,“ Cullen answered with faltering certainty.

“I can come. We can finish this thing off, properly right? Our tragic romance? Go big or go home?”

“Something like that. I’ll pick you up early: it is a long drive.”

“No problem. Thank you. You know where I live already. Obviously,” Evelyn said, cringing internally. Evidently none of that awkwardness from early had been assuaged.

Cullen seemed to be thinking along the same lines. “Thanks for the coffee and for the…”

“It’s blueberry and white chocolate. I thought you could use the extra sugar today.”

“I tried to come and see you earlier but you were out: getting coffee I assume.”

“I heard. I mean I was told.”

“Dorian informed me that if I wanted to get your attention I should take you out to get sushi. That nothing would thrill you more.”

“I don’t even like sushi, which he very well knows. Ugh, his meddling will never cease.”

“I know. Because at age fourteen you ate it before getting on a flight to Orlais and ended up horribly airsick. Now the sight of it makes you feel nauseated. It was in the questionnaire. I reprimanded him firmly for his thoughtless suggestion: a friend should have remembered such a detail.”

Evelyn laughed, stifling it with the back of her hand. “He would have appreciated that: he likes it when people fight back. Says it keeps things more lively.”

She heard him sigh down the phone. “I don’t think I can handle much more liveliness.”

“Me neither to be honest. But it will be okay. One more push and then I will leave you in peace and stop gate crashing your family events,” Evelyn reassured him.

“They won’t take it well, our break up. I think they like you more than they like me. Rosalie and Branson too, and they haven’t even met you yet.”

“Self-deprecating should have been in your character flaw list on the questionnaire. Besides, if they like me it is only because they don’t know me better.”

“Hypocrite, and I don’t think that is true.”

“We’ll find out if they like six-rapid-glasses-of-champagne-later Evelyn.”

“I appreciate your assistance but I might have to draw the line at you getting drunk at my brother’s wedding.”

“Look at the plus side: if I am wasted we can both leave earlier.”

“I’ll pour them myself.”

Evelyn laughed, relieved that their scheming together had finally eased the tension. “Thought that might change your mind. Shall we hold on to that one as a back-up plan? I always like to have an escape route.”

“That is just good tactics and I respect it. I will see you on Saturday.”

“Yep, until Saturday.”

He hung up. Evelyn smiled at her phone, relieved that things were finally back to normal. Well, ‘normal’. It crossed her mind that it shouldn’t matter to her this much.

But it did.

* * *

 

The day of the wedding, Cullen picked her up just after dawn so that they had plenty of time for the drive. The wedding was to be held early in the afternoon. The initial part of the trip had been divided between Cullen giving her a breakdown of his family so that she had a little more context to work with (to help maintain the illusion that they knew each other even vaguely let alone were a couple) and him concentrating on the city traffic. He would stop mid-sentence and lapse into focused concentration whenever a nearby car did anything too reckless. Evelyn should have figured he would be a defensive driver and take his responsibility behind the wheel as seriously as he no doubt took his decision of what pair of socks to wear on any given day. Not that she minded that he was concerned with road safety: she had been in a car with Leliana after all, who casually weaved between traffic with practiced skill but nonetheless left Evelyn clutching whatever hand holds she could find with white knuckles.

After that, the traffic around them thinned out and the buildings fringing the roads became more sparse. Evelyn took the opportunity to do her makeup, squinting into a hand mirror and Cullen politely didn’t comment, even when she spilled powder on his impeccably clean car seat. They lapsed into a companionable silence, the radio playing softly in the background. It was new to her, the concept of a companionable silence. Evelyn was accustomed to environments that encouraged constant conversation, and she had long since learned to help sustain this chatter, balking at any awkward lapses before rushing to fill them.

It wasn’t awkward with Cullen though, and Evelyn did not feel the pressure to fill the space with inane commentary. Somehow it was an entirely different kind of silence that made her feel like her presence was enough. She found it a relaxing and a welcome change.

She was the one to break the silence soon after however. “Did you get a chance to look at my email?” She had sent him her latest record keeping catastrophe late on Friday and it was her first foray into testing the waters of how generous he might be feeling towards her after these favours.

He replied with a wry: “Yes.”

She peered out the window. The houses were few and far between now. “I am sorry, I know it is dismal, and that I am asking a lot. Truthfully I am not even sure if it _can_ all be resolved, the lapses in protocol such as they are.”

“I can resolve it, certainly. With enough time…and coffee.”

“Sorry,” Evelyn said again, meekly.

“It won’t be a problem,” he said.

She had been hoping for a little more reassurance than that. He sounded confident at least, though she had never really doubted his ability. “I know what you must be thinking.”

“Oh?” He glanced across at her, bemused, then quickly returned his eyes to the road no doubt seeking out potential hazards.

“That I have been warned about this so many times before – sometimes by you, often by you – but it keeps happening. You must think I am irresponsible. At _best_ irresponsible.”

“And what do I think you are at worst? Allegedly?”

The question confronted Evelyn. “I am not sure.” She didn’t really want to know what he honestly thought of her and her general ineptitude all of a sudden, though she had been the one to raise the topic. “Incompetent. Just a massive failure I guess.”

Cullen let out a little snort that for a moment, confirmed Evelyn’s worst fears. “I don’t think you’re a failure. Or irresponsible.”

“Really?” Evelyn replied, surprised.

“Maybe a little irresponsible. Occasionally,” he conceded. “But I have more perspective than you realise.”

“Perspective on what?”

“Perspective on how much you accomplish in your role, and how good you are at your job. Exceptionally good and you shouldn’t need me to tell you that. Monitoring performance across the board is an inescapable side effect of my position. I never intend to pry but it means I am aware of how hard you work, often too hard and often much harder than the others. Reason would indicate that when you stretch yourself that thin something has to give; some element is necessarily deprioritised. If that element is something I can assist with I am happy to do it. We – the company - are working towards the same goal: you should not hesitate to delegate, or to ask for help, from me or anyone. It concerns me how much you take upon yourself at times, and that you appear to blame yourself when one of the balls you are juggling inevitably drops. Incompetence is clearly not your problem however perhaps knowing your limit is.”

It was the most words Evelyn had ever heard Cullen say in a row and she was dumbstruck. “Did you…was that a compliment? Buried in there? Somewhere?”

“I will leave that for you to interpret,” he said vaguely, but she could hear his smile without having to look at him.

“Can you repeat it? Or put it down in writing maybe? What was the bit…exceptionally good?”

“No. That was a one-time only monologue. I hope you were paying attention.”

“Cullen, you know I hang off every single one of your words. Always so clever. So insightful.”

 “Save the fawning for our audience.”

“I am getting into character, it is part of my process, darling. If this is to be our last hurrah as a couple I want to give it my all. Sweetheart. Snugglebun. Cully Wully,” Evelyn simpered with increasing intensity.

Cullen groaned. “Spare me please.”

“You have earned yourself some mercy I suppose. I grant you a reprieve.”

He chanced another glance away from the road and smiled at her before they once more lapsed into silence. Evelyn was grateful for this, as it gave her time to try and dissect the intriguing outpouring from Cullen that had been prompted by Maker-only-knew-what.

* * *

 

Evelyn felt like an exhibition at a zoo. The gorgeous bride and elated groom obviously took the lion’s share of the attention, but Evelyn could hardly ignore curious glances in her direction, generally followed by excited, whispered comments amongst groups, resulting in more glances and occasionally, pointed staring.

Cullen was growing increasingly agitated by the behaviour, and kept trying to stand in such a way as to block the spectator’s view of her. Shielding her from the paparazzi, Evelyn guessed. One young woman had actually tried to covertly snap a photo of her with her phone before frantically typing. Evelyn assumed she was sending it to another relative who couldn’t be there to enjoy the spectacle of Cullen’s mystery companion. Evelyn tutted but couldn’t help but smile: families and gossip.

Despite the early start they had arrived just in the nick of time. Cullen and Evelyn had hurriedly taken their seats just as the ceremony began. Though they hadn’t yet had to partake in many actual interactions with the other guests, Evelyn was starting to feel the weight of the pressure to make a good impression. Or not make a bad impression at least. She generally felt confident in her ability to manage social situations, but the fear of making a fool of Cullen in some ridiculous slip up was setting her teeth on edge and distracting her from the wedding. She tried to focus in case she was quizzed on some detail later.

It was a very simple ceremony, with no bridesmaids or groomsmen (which answered an unasked question of Evelyn’s). Though Branson and Cullen likely had their difference they obviously shared a love of uncomplicated, straightforward proceedings. Which by no means undermined the loveliness of the wedding, the simplicity of it instead drawing all focus to the bride and groom and adding considerable weight to each of the small, personalised elements they had chosen to include.

After the ceremony had concluded, there was time for quick congratulations before the couple departed to have photos taken. Evelyn stayed back, hovering at the edge of the crowd until Cullen returned to her, conscious of the fact that she had no right to be here on such an important day for the family and friends of the couple. Sure, she had been invited, but under the falsest of pretences. What if someone else important had missed out on an invitation because Cullen’s ‘new partner’ suddenly took precedent? Feeling like an imposter she tried to keep an inane smile on her face and blend in with furniture.

A wave of relief washed over her when Cullen did weave his way back over. “You look like you’re worried you are about to be caught shoplifting,” he told her.

“That means a lot, coming from you: the _true_ master of deceit.”

He made a downward gesture with his hand indicating she should lower her voice. “Maybe I should get you a drink.”

“I thought you didn’t want me getting drunk. Wait, are we skipping to the emergency back-up plan already?”

“No, I just think you need it. What do you want?”

“Wine.”

“Red or white.”

“Red.”

He fetched it while Evelyn turned down a roaming waiter with a platter of cheese. Was it stealing to eat and drink at a wedding you weren’t supposed to be at? Her qualms were silenced by the welcome sight of Cullen returning once more with a glass, too greater a temptation to resist at this time.

Evelyn was nervously studying the crowd, sipping her glass of wine when a small, plump woman with wild hair just barely tamed into a bun, charged towards her as if intending tackle her to the ground. Evelyn braced herself, which was fortunate as the hug that eventuated could have knocked her off her feet. The wine in her glass sloshed dangerously above both their heads and Cullen, ever vigilant, retrieved it from her.

“Rosalie,” the woman said by way of introduction as she stepped back, and then made a fuss of brushing Evelyn’s shoulders off as if suddenly conscious her enthusiastic embrace might have rumpled her outfit.

“My sister. My other sister, youngest sister,” Cullen explained. Rosalie hugged him too, briefly, dismissively, before turning back to Evelyn.

“Wow,” Rosalie said, smiling broadly, narrowing her glittering eyes and looking her up and down.

“Hello,” Evelyn said tentatively.

“You’re frightening her Rosalie, she isn’t used to your particular brand of intensity,” Cullen admonished.

“No, most people aren’t. Right Cullen?” she laughed heartily and scrunched her freckled nose as Cullen shook his head. “Embarrassing my older brother since the day I was born? This girl!” She used two thumbs to point at herself proudly before returning her scrutiny to Evelyn. “Wow!”

“Hi,” Evelyn said again, laughing a little.

“Sorry. Just kind of crazy to meet you. In the flesh. Finally. Like fiiiiiinally.” When Evelyn, perplexed, failed to respond, Rosalie threw in an additional: “Finally!” for good measure.

“Oh,” Evelyn said, casting Cullen a confused look which he mirrored. “Well, we haven’t been together for very long.”

“Yeah but we – hi Mia!” Rosalie greeted her sister who had just joined them.

“Hello all. Cullen, did you notice the decorations?” Mia asked with a teasing smile.

Cullen looked around the room. “Yes, they are f-,” he caught himself from saying ‘fine’ as Evelyn elbowed him and instead finished with an even lamer: “very…decorative,” having searched and apparently failed to find a better word. The three women rolled their eyes simultaneously.

“The flowers on the tables look lovely,” Evelyn said, “I never would have thought to set them out like that with the fairy lights. Such a pretty effect, and the drapes are so elegant.”

“I am glad you made it Evelyn, and managed to look around and take in the ambience at least! Wasted on some people, honestly,” Mia said with emphasis aimed at Cullen. “Hope the drive was okay.”

“It was alright,” Cullen answered. “There should be less traffic tonight.”

“You aren’t staying at the hotel?” Mia asked.

“No,” Cullen said.

“That is a lot of driving in one day,” Mia said sounding concerned.

“We need to get back for work,” Cullen said and Evelyn nodded. On a Sunday apparently. Fortunately, their respective reputations as work-obsessed preceded them and the lie was convincing enough.

“I should have guessed,” Mia said with a half-smile. “I despair I really do.”

“I was just telling Evelyn how it was torture waiting so, so long to meet her,” Rosalie said.

“We have been together less than a year,” Cullen said, clarifying Evelyn’s previous statement.

Rosalie and Mia exchanged knowing looks. “Yeah but we knew before then. Long before then.”

“Knew what?” Evelyn asked.

“Rosalie,” Cullen warned.

“In his frankly incredibly inconsistent and brief phone calls – but that is a conversation for another day,” she gave Cullen a firm look, “he always went on and on about you,” Rosalie told Evelyn.

“He did?” Evelyn said.

“I didn’t,” Cullen said.

“On and onnnnn,” Rosalie said again.

“No,” Cullen said.

“You did. A bit,” Mia added, seeing her brother’s mounting discomfort but unable to resist contributing to it a little.

 “That’s not true,” Cullen said. Evelyn didn’t know what to say: she felt like she was missing something crucial.

“Come on,” Rosalie said with an exaggerated sigh. “You barely even refer to any of your colleagues by name and then this new _mystery_ _lady_ turns up and all of a sudden it is all,” Rosalie used her hand like a puppet speaking: “‘Evelyn broke another sales record’ and ‘Evelyn poached a client from a competitor when everyone else said it was impossible’ and ‘Evelyn got another promotion’ and ‘the company is expanding beyond our most optimistic forecasts because Evelyn Evelyn _Evelyn’_.” Mia nodded in agreement as Rosalie spoke.

“You’re exaggerating,” Cullen said, voice a little faint.

“Nah,” Rosalie said simply, giving him a smug smile.

Evelyn, sensing Cullen’s embarrassment and desperate to alleviate it said: “I am grateful for Cullen’s continued confidence in me and of course, there has always been a lot of mutual respect in the workplace.”

“Ohhh, ‘mutual respect’? Is that what the kids are calling it these days?” Rosalie said with a wink and snort of laughter and Mia stepped in to nudge and shush her sister. Evelyn swallowed a large mouthful of wine.

“Sorry Evelyn, it has been a big day for her. The excitement goes straight to her head,” Mia explained.

“That is putting it lightly.” Cullen said.

Evelyn couldn’t decide if it was a mercy or not when additional relatives joined them shortly thereafter and put her last-minute study in the car with Cullen to the test. Luckily she kept all of her facts straight, and simply opted to stay quiet when a crucial detail eluded her and Cullen would quickly step in to fill the gap. There was some obvious leeway, at any rate, as she was meeting them all for the first time. Largely they were very friendly, although they seemed to be receiving as many congratulations as the wedded couple and the word ‘miracle’ may have been bandied about a few times much to Cullen’s annoyance.

In fact, despite Cullen’s, Mia’s and her own best efforts to keep changing topic, once they were seated down for their meal it was incredibly difficult to get the other relatives at the table to talk about anything other than the apparently intriguing notion of their relationship.

“So, what did you do on your first date?” A man with over-gelled hair whose name Evelyn couldn’t remember asked. “Only because I can’t decide if it would have been incredibly boring or if Cullen is actually a secret romantic. Horses and carriages, hundreds of red roses and the like.”

Cullen and Evelyn exchanged slightly panicked looks. “It was nice, just coffee. I think we had muffins. Got to know each other a bit, outside of work,” Evelyn said, thinking of the day with the questionnaires. Better to keep it simple. “These bread rolls are very fluffy aren’t they?” She was fast running out of topic changes, not that any of them had been successful yet.

“Not exactly Romeo and Juliet,” the man scoffed.

“I consider that to be a positive,” Cullen said. “Did anyone read the financial news this morning? They are predicting a downturn,” he said in an equally as heavy-handed attempt to change the subject.

“And when did he actually get the guts to ask you out Evelyn? Set the scene: where were you?” a woman asked, leaning towards them, chin in her hand. Sarah? Sally? That name escaped Evelyn too.

“Ooh,” Rosalie sighed. “A flowery meadow? Castle ramparts in the snow? Sharing an umbrella while feeding ducks at a lake?”

“In a stairwell,” Evelyn answered bluntly before she could give it more thought. Cullen made a jerky motion beside her that might have been a cringe or a laugh.

“What? Cullen, I expected more of you! That is awful. After all that pining, asking her out in a bloody stairwell!” Rosalie said, clearly aghast.

“I asked him out actually. Kind of…trapped him into it I guess,” Evelyn said with a weak laugh before Cullen could argue. There was an excited murmur around the table.

“A sensible move,” an older man across the table said. “Likely would have taken him years. Decades even. Your first date could have been at the bowls club.” This was met with general laughter from everyone except Cullen. Even Evelyn let out a guilty chuckle.

“I wonder where Branson has gotten to? I want a photo of all of us together,” Mia said looking around, trying to create a distraction.

“You have to forgive Cullen,” Rosalie said.

“I do. Every day,” Evelyn said for intentional comic effect which set the table off laughing again.

“Thanks for that,” Cullen said to her which only elicited more laughter.

“He hasn’t had much experience, you know: _wooing_ ,” Rosalie explained.

“Rosalie,” Mia said sharply as Cullen put a hand over his face.

Rosalie forged onwards: “Never enough practice. Too busy obsessively pursuing that military career all through his youth to obsess over girls.”

It was if the whole room dropped in volume. Everyone at the table certainly fell perfectly silent and Evelyn felt an uncomfortable shift in the mood. “I never knew you were in the military,” Evelyn said to Cullen who was sitting rigidly beside her, staring at Rosalie. Evelyn was surprised that despite their short acquaintance, this had not come up.

“That is because I intentionally choose not to talk about it,” Cullen answered sharply, his warning gaze still fixed on Rosalie.

“Oh, I didn’t…I thought you would have…Sorry Cullen,” Rosalie said, flustered under the steady, admonishing gaze of her brother. Evelyn pitied the younger woman who was going pink with humiliation.

“Cullen, she didn’t mean to,” Evelyn told him.

Cullen looked to her and his expression softened. “I became disillusioned, lost my sense of purpose and because of that, among other reasons, discontinued a career down that path.” He looked suddenly tired. “It is not who I am.”

“You don’t have to – You don’t owe me an explanation,” Evelyn said softly, her pity now turning to the discomfort in Cullen’s expression, and the echo of pain evident as he had spoken. For the benefit of the rest of the anxiously watching table she raised her voice: “Besides, there are lots of things I haven’t told you. Like that I once won a pogo stick endurance competition.”

“You did what?” Mia asked as Cullen let out a surprised laugh.

“I’m astonished. You certainly never mentioned _that_ ,” Cullen said.

“Yes well, I didn’t want you to feel intimidated by me,” Evelyn said, with a slight flick of her hair for dramatic effect. Their other companions were laughing, Rosalie too and the tension that had oppressed the group moments before was broken.

“Tell me Evelyn, is this the kind of event one trains for?” Mia asked, in the tone of an inquiring journalist.

“Extensively,” Evelyn answered solemnly. “Though much of it comes down to natural talent.”

“I can understand that,” said a woman who had been silent up to this point. “I have never lost a game of limbo. A lot of responsibility comes with that kind of skill.”

Evelyn smiled benignly as accusations of cheating and demands for a rematch were hurled across the table at the woman and the conversation swelled excitedly as several other members of their party began to reveal hidden talents, increasingly bizarre in nature. She started a little when Cullen found her hand in her lap under the table and gently squeezed it.

Eyes wide she turned to him. His grateful look indicated he knew exactly what she had been doing: rescuing both him and Rosalie by changing the subject. She shook her head to say: _“It’s nothing”_ and felt a warmth in her cheeks as he tilted his head with a raised eyebrow and the faintest of smiles as if to reply: _“No it’s not.”_

She felt like she should pull away from his touch but for the longest time, did not move and neither did he until finally they separated their hands in order to applaud the first of the wedding speakers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the slightly off schedule chapter. I had a busy couple of work weeks and couldn't face editing! Even this edit was a bit rushed (sorry!) but I really wanted to get this up now otherwise I wasn't sure when I would get an opportunity. Back on track hopefully, stay tuned for more wedding shenanigans and the final chapter. Thanks so much for reading, truly can't say that enough. :)


	5. Diverge

A reprieve from the incessant questioning finally came after the speeches, as the band started up and eager guests flocked to the dance floor. Cullen was not amongst them, and Evelyn stayed loyally at his side, even as she was prevailed upon from all fronts, as the rest of their companions up and left. Their table was close to a wall, and nearly in the corner of the room, quite tucked away as the main lights were dimmed and comfortably, they watched from a distance as the majority of the guests writhed, flailed and laughed, greeting each new song with recognition and enthusiasm.

Eventually Evelyn leaned towards Cullen and said: “I’m shocked you’re not fighting for a space out there.”

“Really?” Cullen asked, but in a sarcastic, drawn enough manner to indicate that he knew she was joking.

Evelyn sighed melodramatically. “I suppose I should resign myself now to the fact that you are not going to ask me to dance tonight in order to avoid any sustained disappointment.”

“That would be wise.”

“Do you choose not to dance as a rule? Or can you not?”

“The former,” he said, then quickly added: “And the latter.”

“Very well, I shall dance alone.”

“Have fun, I will see you later.”

Evelyn laughed brightly. “Oh no! No no no! I can’t go out there without my escort! No goodness me.” She rose, enjoying the look of alarm on his face. “No, I shall dance right here. And given you have indicated that you lack the ability to join me, I shall use the opportunity to impart some of my expertise.”

Cullen looked truly terrified now and was scooting back in his seat away from her. She wondered if he was afraid she was about to give him a lap dance. Instead, she cleared her throat authoritatively, reached her left hand out in front of herself as if gripping a handle, and used her right hand to reach for an item off and imaginary shelf. An eighties dance classic was playing which was perfect for Evelyn’s particular dance style: patently dorky.  “This,” she began as she dropped the item in front of her with a flourish, “is a sophisticated and timeless move called ‘The Shopping Cart’.” She repeated the motion, adding a bit of head bobbing and sashaying her hips. Cullen groaned, and looked displeased as she ‘shopped’ around him.

“And this,” Evelyn said, changing positions, placing one hand behind her head with a dramatic sweep of her arm, “is called ‘The Sprinkler’,” she finished thrusting her other arm outwards and commencing the move. Cullen continued to look sulky, but as Evelyn persisted, growing increasingly more vigorous in her demonstrations, she saw his determinedly stern countenance begin to crack, a grin tugging at the corner of his lips.

“Please,” he said, slightly strained, “have mercy.”

“The Running Man,” Evelyn said, undeterred. This one she acknowledged she was not particularly adept at, but what she lacked in technique she made up for in enthusiasm and zest. Cullen let out a snort and covered his eyes with the back of his hand as his body shook with repressed mirth.

“No, don’t close your eyes!” she said. “My favourite: ‘The Lawnmower’.” She began an energetic rendition and Cullen stood up, finally laughing, and caught her wrists to stop her, helping her upright.

“Please, I am worried you are going to hurt yourself. Or that I am going to hurt myself laughing.”

“Fine,” Evelyn said, panting a little, embarrassingly enough. “But I think I have proven the point that you don’t need to be able to dance to do it.”

“But _should_ you?” Cullen said scathingly, eyes still glittering with barely repressed laughter.

“How dare you?” Evelyn said, trying to sound offended but struggling not to laugh too. She shrugged off his grip as the song changed to something slower paced. “Luckily for you I can’t do any of my rad moves to this.”

“You can’t but perhaps I can.” He held out his hand to her, formally, palm upwards and bowing slightly. Like they were students at a prom, Evelyn thought. “May I have this dance?”

Evelyn was startled, but took his hand without hesitation. “Of course, but I thought you just said you don’t dance.”

“After that effort, I owe it to you to try.” Evelyn’s heart was racing, probably from the exertion of her earlier dance moves. Cullen gripped her hand firmly and Evelyn relented as he gently pulled her towards him. Even so, she found herself covertly glancing around, self-conscious, as if she was worried about being seen.  As if she had forgotten that people already thought they were a couple. Evelyn put her free hand on Cullen’s shoulder, he put his on her waist. A respectful distance remained between them. There in the half-light amongst the empty tables, the dance floor seemed miles away: they could have been the only people in the room.

Evelyn glanced up with a shy smile and they began to sway, turning slowly.  “There you go. Well done, you are doing great,” she said encouragingly.

“After what I have just witnessed forgive me if your assessment does not fill me with a renewed confidence in my ability.”

“That was a complicated way of saying my opinion is invalid.”

“No, it was a complicated way of saying you’re an awful dancer,” he teased.

Evelyn jerked her head back so she could give him a narrow look. “Do you always insult women as you dance with them?”

“I don’t.”

“Insult them?”

“Dance with them.”

“So why now?”

“I thought I may never get another chance,” he said, voice low, expression unreadable.

It wasn’t an answer Evelyn could decipher so she focused instead on the scar on his lip that she hadn’t really seen up this close before, and how good he smelled: something woodsy but there was a sweet note, like new spring elderflowers and dewy oakmoss crushed underfoot. It made her want to draw in closer to him, and the distance between them felt suddenly unbearable. Yet at the same time, she felt intrusive: noticing such details, liking such details. He was her colleague. Just her colleague. And right now he was simply being polite and humouring her.

She stopped swaying abruptly and he followed suit.

“Evelyn?” he said, his voice maddeningly gentle, which only made her feel more drawn to him, more conflicted.

Her head was spinning, though they had hardly been moving vigorously enough to justify it. She pressed her palm to her forehead for a moment, trying to will her unruly mind to calm as his hand slipped from her waist. “I think I need some air.”

 She quickly made for the nearest door and did not stop until she was right at the edge of the balcony, leaning over the railing, taking deep breaths of soothing evening air. She was overwhelmed, that was all, she tried to reassure herself. That one glass of wine had gone straight to her head.

Cullen joined her only moments later, having evidently detoured to fetch her a glass of water. “Are you alright?” he asked, passing it to her.

“Well enough,” she said, gratefully taking a drink. Why did he have to be so thoughtful? It was infuriating.

He let out a sceptical “Hmm,” and said: “somehow I don’t believe you.”

Evelyn turned to look at him and found him watching her with concern. He looked so handsome, in the last of the fading daylight, and she could almost convince herself his expression was truly affectionate. Genuinely affectionate. Real. Maker, what was wrong with her? When did she start forgetting that this was a performance? “I was getting confused,” she answered faintly, but honestly enough.

She had intended to say more but Cullen spoke: “I can understand that: my family is a lot to contend with. It has been…a long day.” Evelyn felt deflated, but she shook it off. That was not what she had meant of course, but let him think that. It was simpler than the truth. She mentally commanded herself to snap out of it, before forcing a smile to reassure him she was okay.

“And you? How are you coping?” He let out a long breath and arms outstretched, leaned forwards to brace himself against the balcony railing, staring out into the distance. Evelyn felt a pang of guilt. “I feel like I am…I feel like our situation is detracting from your brother’s wedding. I hope the day isn’t spoiled.” Placing her glass on a nearby table, she copied him, leaning forwards and staring out at the horizon, the dusty orange twilight and the first of the stars.

“No, don’t think like that. Your being here hasn’t detracted in the slightest.”

“Really?” she said, voice laden with scepticism.

“If you weren’t here they would only be desperately trying to matchmake me with another guest.”

“Well, you might have missed a good opportunity to meet someone then! An actual someone that is, not like me.”

“I prefer you,” he said, before quickly adding: “Our arrangement, I mean.”

“You flatterer,” Evelyn said drily. Cullen did not reply and eventually Evelyn said: “They do give you a hard time, don’t they? Like a really hard time. Though clearly they mean well.”

“I have given them cause enough to worry in the past. Now they wish to see me…settled. For their own peace of mind. I can’t blame them.”

“Do you want to be settled?”

“Maybe I am already settled, in my own way. It is not what they want for me but I find it hard to imagine…” he trailed off and tilted his head to look at her, but didn’t seem to realise she could see him staring out the corner of her eye.

“So you don’t know what you would want out of a relationship?”  she said, before adding tentatively: “Or what kind of person you would look for?”

He turned his gaze abruptly away. “I have a clear idea on that.” He paused, then continued: “I don’t….I don’t believe I have much to offer.”

Evelyn let out a gasp of faux outrage. “Now that just isn’t true!” Cullen was startled by the sudden increase in volume. “You’re smart, very smart. Thoughtful, patient, though occasionally tactless. Frequently tactless actually. But funny, when you want to be. Faaaairly handsome,” she said, squinting at him, angling her head from side to side as if contemplating the idea until embarrassed, he had to look away.

“I wasn’t trying to fish for compliments,” he said, rolling his shoulders and shifting uncomfortably.

“I know you weren’t, because you aren’t vain. Another good thing about you.”

Cullen shook his head, obviously desperate to change the subject. “And what about you? Why are you single?”

“Well, that was a bit abrupt,” Evelyn said with a snicker.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean…”

“I know,” she sighed. “Truth is Dorian keeps chasing all my suitors off. Hitting them with a stick.”

Cullen looked as if he was considering whether this might be true for a moment before saying: “Very funny.”

“My family isn’t like yours. My parents, I think, would much rather me be single than fraternising with the ‘wrong type’. Makes it easier in a lot of ways. Harder in others. Of course, I am not obligated to do as they ask but…it makes my life simpler to avoid upsetting them. Where possible.”

“And who exactly is the ‘wrong type’ in their opinion?”

“Anyone who isn’t a child of someone they mingle with at their country club or golf club…or yacht club. Old fashioned but sadly true.”

“Well that must narrow the pool down significantly.”

“And what is left in that puddle is murky and dull and…arrogant and selfish.”

“Sounds charming.”

“Yes, I definitely prefer our arrangement to that too,” she teased.

“I’m honoured, and against such stiff competition. Better than the sludge at the bottom of a stagnant puddle,” he said, grinning at her. “An accomplishment indeed.”

“Only just!” she told him and he clutched at his heart like she had wounded him. “So all in all, puddle scum and parental expectations in consideration, sometimes it is easier to just not think about it. Or try.”

“I can understand that,” Cullen said, voice a little rueful, and Evelyn believed that he truly meant it, and appreciated the mutual sense of understanding, despite the differences in their situation.

“Though,” Evelyn added, “of course if I felt there was someone truly worthwhile in my life, the opinion of my parents would obviously be no obstacle. It’s not the sixteenth century.”

“No, it isn’t,” Cullen said. The sun had disappeared fully below the horizon now, and the stars shone from their navy-blue canvas with increasing intensity as the light faded. It was a beautiful view. Abruptly, Cullen began again: “Mia was wrong, about me always knowing what I want. Do you remember her saying that?”

“Yes,” Evelyn said uncertainly. She was confused by the sudden shift in tone as her mind raced back to their dinner outing, trying to recall the context of the statement Cullen was referring to. It all felt like a lifetime ago.

 “That is, I generally do. But sometimes I am a coward.” Cullen said. He sounded nearly angry. At himself? Evelyn felt suddenly wired, a surge of adrenaline had hit her bloodstream but she couldn’t explain in anticipation of what. She was nervous. “Evelyn?” he asked in a much gentler voice, as if checking she was still there.

“Yes?” she said again, breath hitching slightly.

“I really meant it when I said that you being here hasn’t detracted from the day. I should have let you make up an excuse and get out of it but I knew you would come if I asked. I have been selfish.”

“Selfish? Selfish how?” Evelyn asked, still perplexed.

“Perhaps I was of a mind to drag this whole, ridiculous charade out because –”

A swell in noise behind them and a few close-by yells startled them both. A glance back towards their table through the open doors confirmed that their companions were returning to their seats. Cullen let out an exasperated huff.

“We should probably head back in,” Evelyn said.

Cullen groaned. “I’d rather not. I’m finally enjoying myself.”

Evelyn laughed and pulled on his arm. He pretended to resist her by clinging to the railing more firmly. “I think they might be about to serve dessert. That is enough to motivate me at least. Please, don’t make me go alone.”

“I suppose I can’t let you face them unprotected. They are worse when they have been drinking. Much worse.”

“Not unless you want me to start making up stories about you in your absence. And I really want some cake.”

He relented and they went to go in when Cullen stopped, staring inside with trepidation, reluctant to go further.

“Okay?” Evelyn asked.

“Yes, just reaching the end of my tether I think,” he said.

Evelyn squeezed his arm. “We should leave shortly.”

“Agreed.”

Inside, Evelyn went straight for the cake and was content, for the briefest of moments. But Cullen remained edgy, even more guarded than before, posture tense, drumming his fingers on his knee, looking about him like he was expecting an incoming attack. There had been a dangerous shift in his mood since they had left the balcony and re-entered the fray of the party. His agitation worried her, especially as it was immediately obvious that a considerable amount of drink had been consumed in a very short space of time by their fellow guests. Dancing had made them thirsty, the drink made them rowdy.

Evelyn was just about to suggest to Cullen that maybe they forget leaving shortly and leave immediately, when someone, an uncle she thought, approached the table and slapped Cullen on the back. “We have been going easy on you,” he drawled.

“Have you indeed?” Cullen said, discomfort palpable.

“Yes, I think the question we have all been wanting to ask is _when will it be your turn_?” he all but hissed it in Cullen’s ear before slapping him on the back again, winking at Evelyn and heavily taking a seat.

“Yeah, you two are sooo cute together,” someone else chimed in, Evelyn wasn’t sure who: their faces were all beginning to blur together in the dimmed lighting and she felt a desperate need to figure out an escape route. An image flashed to mind of throwing Cullen over her shoulder and sprinting out with him.

Impractical. Probably.

“We saw you out on the balcony together, canoodling,” another person added, with an entirely excessive amount of eyebrow wriggling.

“Only a matter of time: I can almost hear the bells,” another woman added, excitedly cupping her ear.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Cullen said, an edge to his voice. Evelyn took a hasty mouthful of cake but found it difficult to swallow.

“Ridiculous? What a thing to say, in front of your lady! What a thing! That he finds the idea of marrying her ridiculous!” a woman objected loudly, slurring slightly.

“Right to her face!” someone added.

“You’re lucky she puts up with that from you!” Someone else new, sloshing her drink as she spoke. Cullen was looking furious. Evelyn glanced around but there was no sign of Mia or Rosalie. Branson was dancing like an electrified octopus at the centre of the floor.

“I don’t know how she _does_ put up with him,” another voice added.

“I think that is enough,” Evelyn said, tone light, but feeling anxious at the sight of Cullen’s deepening frown, and his hands clenched into fists under the table.

“Oh look at her! So defensive of him! We’re just saying how happy we are for you both, no need to get all cagey.”

“She was not being cagey. You’re the one acting unacceptably,” Cullen said.

There was a guffaw in response. “Looks like water is thicker than blood! He has shown where his loyalty lies. She has him in her web all right,” the uncle teased, stabbing in Cullen’s direction with a dripping spoon.

“Maybe the celebrant is still here and they could just get it over with!” The woman looked about the room as if this was likely. “We’re all in the mood for it already and it saves on travel costs.”

“Yes, absolutely, smitten they are,” one of the other women interjected. “I don’t want to be dragged across the country in another six months when we could just sort it now.” Leaning across the table towards Cullen and half covering her mouth she added: “Personally, I _would_ rush it through Cullen. Before she gets to know you better and comes to her senses,” she punctuated her sentence with a cackle.

“That’s not fair,” Evelyn said, knowing it was pointless. Cullen stood up as if to leave.

“Oh Maker he is doing it! I think he is about to propose!” someone shrieked and the group watched on eagerly. More people were flocking to discover the source of the fuss, peering at Cullen and Evelyn eagerly, like children at a sweet shop window.

“I am not,” Cullen said curtly. Evelyn stood up to leave too, grabbing her cake to take with her.

“What is going on here? Cullen, you look like you are about to pop a vein,” Rosalie said as she and Mia arrived at the table, pink cheeked from dancing and arms linked.

“Go on, just do it!” another relative yelled, ignoring the arrival of Cullen’s sisters.

“I will not.”

“Will not what?” Rosalie asked.

“Cullen’s going to propose!” someone explained unhelpfully.

“Oh that would be lovely!” Rosalie said.

“Stop putting pressure on them!” Mia shouted at the same time in a surprisingly authoritative voice that sadly had no effect.

“Are you really?” Rosalie asked Cullen.

“No,” he spat.

“When then?” The heckles grew in intensity and that loud, cackling laughter started up again. Mia looked frantic and tried hopelessly to quiet them. Cullen looked irate. Evelyn wondered how to help him but could only think of throwing a glass of water in his face which seemed counterproductive. She touched his arm, felt the muscle only tense more beneath her fingertips and quickly withdrew her hand.

 “Hurry up!”

“Get a move on!”

Finally reaching boiling point, and making a firm swiping motion with his hand, Cullen yelled back: “I will never marry her!” Silence fell. No one moved until Evelyn carefully put her cake back down on the table. Mia threw first her, then Cullen a perplexed look like a spaniel trying to figure out which one of them was holding a tennis ball behind their back. Cullen, immediately deflated from his brief outburst, looked at Evelyn apologetically. “I’m sorry.”

Stomach leaden, she shook her head. “It’s okay.”

“It is _not_ okay. So you should be sorry Cullen! Maker Evelyn, is this what you have to deal with?” a horrified relative said, looking between the two of them.

“No, she doesn’t have to deal with this,” Cullen said in a calm voice. Evelyn could tell he was resigned to a confession now and she hung her head, unable to make eye contact with Mia. “She doesn’t have to deal with this because we are not a couple.”

“You’ve broken up! At a _wedding_!” one of the women wailed. “It’s bad luck!”

“We haven’t broken up. We were never together in the first place. Evelyn was helping…” he looked at her like he was drowning and trailed off. “I just wanted you all to give me some peace for once,” he finished quietly still looking at Evelyn.

Evelyn wanted to reach out to him again but sensed that would only add to the confusion. Instead she kept nervously twisting the napkin still in her hands. She also felt like she should speak, apologise, but one glance at Rosalie’s stricken expression, and at Mia who had a hand over her mouth in shock, stopped her in her tracks. The rest of the table had nothing to say for the first time in hours.

“But we saw you dancing,” Rosalie said, voice brimming with childlike disappointment, her comment sending a stab of pain through Evelyn’s heart. Cullen made no answer, just shook his head.

“It was just a joke then. Real bad taste Cullen, especially for one who always _acts_ so superior,” the uncle said mockingly.

“Yes,” Cullen said coldly. “As usual I have disappointed you all.”

“Are you really Evelyn? Evelyn from work?” Mia asked.

“Did you hire her or something?” someone else interjected.

“No,” Cullen said sharply.

“Yes, we do know each other from work. I’m so sorry Mia, I didn’t mean to cause a scene,” Evelyn said but the words felt vastly insufficient. Were vastly insufficient. Evelyn felt a little ill, she wished she hadn’t had any cake.

“You meant well,” Mia said, with an unconvincing smile, still looking very hurt which made Evelyn feel terrible.

“I think we should leave,” Cullen told her and Evelyn nodded meekly.

“Run away then Cullen, we’ve all seen that before. Quite your speciality, isn’t it?” the uncle mocked as they walked away.

“Cullen, wait!” Mia called after them, a distressed waiver in her voice. But she made no effort to follow.  

Cullen ignored them both and weaved rapidly through the tables, Evelyn at his heels, almost trotting to keep up. They intercepted a still elated Branson briefly to congratulate him once more, enduring a horrible moment in which Evelyn was excitedly introduced to his new wife as Cullen’s partner.

Nodding and smiling, they did not seek to correct him. He would find out soon enough: let him enjoy his wedding.

It was a relief to get into the car and begin driving away, the slamming doors cutting off the distant, drifting music and laughter from the party. Evelyn couldn’t shake the feeling the whole wedding crowd was watching them leave from the balconies and windows of the venue. Maybe they were.

When they were back on the highway, Evelyn chanced a look at Cullen’s profile, stony and impassive, staring down the road with fixed determination and said: “I am sorry that ended the way it did.”

“Don’t be. I suspect the truth would have come out eventually.” She found it impossible to read his mood from his voice. After the brief meltdown, he was apparently back to being totally composed-Cullen, entirely in control of himself and his emotions. Evelyn, who was still in turmoil, felt shut out. But what right did she have to push him on what he was feeling?

She nervously smoothed her skirt over her knees. “Families have a habit of that, one way or another. I should have thought of that…this was stupid from the outset. Now things will be worse for you.”

“Not necessarily. Perhaps it will give them a reality check and they will back off. Their behaviour was disgusting tonight: that is not your fault.”

“I hope so.” Evelyn looked at her hands. “I mostly feel bad about Mia, Rosalie and Branson. Especially Mia. I really like them all and now I’ve…” Evelyn couldn’t finish. She and Mia would have been friends, if they had met in some other way, unrelated too this farce. Of that she was certain and she felt the loss of that hypothetical friendship keenly.

“Mia is never going to be angry at someone she can see was trying to help me in some way,” Cullen said.

“I kind of wish she would be a bit angry. That is half of what is making me feel bad. She is too kind for her own good.”

“She certainly is.”

“Apologise for me again. For what it is worth. When you speak to them.”

“There really is no need, but I will, if it is of comfort to you.”

“Thanks.”

“No, thank you.”

The drove on into the night, no sign of the light of the party in the rear-view mirror now. Sometime later, still upset, stomach still churning, Evelyn said on an impulse: “I wish I’d never gone out into the corridor, at the end of year party. Never run into you.” She rubbed uselessly at the powder mark she had left on the car seat earlier in the day.

“Don’t say that,” Cullen said, so quietly she had trouble making out the words over the sound of engine.

“We could have avoided all of this.”

Cullen made no indication he had heard her and did not reply. They did not speak for the rest of the drive and Evelyn pretended to sleep to spare them both any obligation to discuss the matter further.

They parted, as he dropped her off at her apartment complex, with a simple ‘goodnight’.

Walking away from the car hurt. Every molecule seemed to resist forward movement, like she was a ship, sailing against a grounded anchor, and Evelyn found herself having to think very hard about the practical details of how to walk. It was ridiculous, what point would there be in rushing back to the car, back to Cullen, as her instincts seemed to urge her to? Surely there could be nothing left to say. Their absurd ruse was at an end and he was probably relieved to see the back of her.

Wasn’t he?

Cullen waited until he could see she was safely inside the lobby before driving off which for some reason triggered a surge of sadness that made Evelyn’s heart ache. He was still being a good boyfriend even after all this. But it was finally over now. Feeling crushingly overwhelmed, embarrassed beyond measure and exhausted from the long day, Evelyn finally let out a few pathetic, long-repressed sobs in the elevator.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wait a second...wasn't this supposed to be the last chapter? Why yes, yes it was! What happened? Well, here is the honest truth: while editing I kept adding and adding and was going to have an extra long final chapter but eventually it got ridiculous and I had to split it. I did not deceive you intentionally, so sorry! So instead I leave you here on this cheery note and will see you again soon with the REAL final chapter. :) 
> 
> Thanks to you all for reading and for the incredible support. I have a lot going on all of a sudden on RL and wasn't sure I would have this out this week but you all inspired me to not just get it edited, but to accidentally write an entire extra chapter... This is a team effort clearly! Thanks so much!


	6. Converge

It had been a solid week since the wedding. Since they had spoken. She suspected they were both very aware of that. Or perhaps it was just her. She hoped not.

With no small amount of courage and a renewed sense of determination Evelyn had decided it was high time to clear the air.

Or muddy the waters.

Evelyn was losing track of precisely what she was trying to achieve and her metaphors. But it was one of the two.

Dorian had told her she looked scared.

“I am a little nervous,” she had admitted, checking her face in a hand mirror reflexively and without really seeing it before tucking it back in her purse.

“No, the word I used was _scared_ , not nervous. Goes to prove there is something at stake for you in this despite your pitiful attempts at nonchalance.”

“Stop trying to turn everything into a…thing,” Evelyn snapped back.

“The only one creating ‘things’ is you. You’re the producer, director and lead actress of the entire ‘thing’. ‘Thing’? More like a grand spectacle ‘thing’ arena show.”

“I am going to go and have a conversation. Just a conversation. To smooth over my working relationship with my _colleague_. Do we need to go over it again? Would a PowerPoint presentation help you comprehend the concept?”

“I have seen you go off to have plenty of conversations, but prior to these I have never witnessed you check your face in a mirror four times.”

“It wasn’t four times,” Evelyn said haughtily (even though it definitely had been), taking that as her queue to stop dithering and finally leave. She stood up and adjusted her skirt while Dorian examined her.

“Face is fine, all features attached and accounted for,” Dorian said.

Evelyn tilted her head in amusement. “That is quite the compliment by your standards.”

Dorian looked at her seriously over steepled fingers. “Evelyn, he would be a fool not to –”

“No, that’s enough! It’s nothing!” Evelyn interrupted, partly because she was worried about the rest of the room hearing and partly because she didn’t want to jinx anything.

Dorian’s eyes glittered with unspoken witticisms as he took mercy on her and said a simple and sincere: “Best of luck then,” as she turned on her heel and walked away.

What Evelyn could not bear to verbalise to Dorian were her nagging doubts, the ones that left with a sour, queasy feeling in the depths of her stomach. There had been more than enough opportunity for Cullen to say something if he felt…anything during their time together. But he had given no indication. Though in her more fanciful moments Evelyn wondered if he had and if she had just been too obtuse to realise.

Then again, he had not reached out in any way since the night of the wedding. He apparently had no objections to her slipping back out of his life as abruptly as she had slipped in. Evelyn however (though it had taken her some time to be able to admit it to herself) had begun to feel his absence keenly. Enough was enough. Before she sent herself mad. Before _he_ sent her mad.

Dorian said she seemed melancholy, her other friends said she seemed distracted. Her work was suffering as her mind wandered during the day, staring unseeingly at her monitor, just as she stared blankly at her ceiling at night, sleep maddeningly evading her.

She could not leave it be - Cullen be - without a resolution, for better or for worse.

The elevator ride seemed quicker than usual and Evelyn crossed the accounting department in a daze, arriving at Cullen’s door before she had even had a chance to fully conceptualise what exactly she was hoping to accomplish. Nervous energy fizzing inside of her, she knocked.

“I was hoping you’d drop by,” he said warmly as she tentatively poked her head into his office. “We left things on a rather uncomfortable note. I wanted to…” he trailed off. Maker only knew what he was wanted and why he hadn’t just bloody done it already, Evelyn thought agitatedly. She found his relative composure grating. “I –”

“I brought you a plant!” she all but yelled at him. Real smooth start.

“You brought me what?”

“A plant. The plant that you tried to murder actually.” She placed the newly repotted succulent on his desk. “Seemed cruel to separate the two of you after you just got to know one another.”

“It survived,” Cullen said, sounding genuinely pleased. This heartened her somewhat: the gesture was not unwelcome.

“It was a rough night, but we all did,” she threw him a quick, flustered smile. “And I wanted to speak to you too. Privately actually,” Evelyn clarified in a lowered voice, deeply conscious of the rest of the accounting department scattered about behind her, all of whom had watched her walk across the office with bird-like curiosity, heads tilted, eyes bright with interest. Dorian would no doubt explain this fascination by implying that her and Cullen’s faux-relationship was probably the most exciting thing that had ever happened in the doldrums of the accounting department.

Cullen rose to follow her out. He was still so calm and at that moment she hated him a little for it.  He didn’t need to ask where they were going. It felt strange to return to the stairwell again and remember their first conversation there. Fully out of earshot of their colleagues, Cullen started: “I am sorry for my display at the wedding, and for any embarrassment it may have caused you.”

“Caused me?” she asked, a little incredulous. “No, I shouldn’t have pushed you into starting the lie in the first place. You were obviously uncomfortable. I thought I was helping you. It went too far. Perhaps from the very beginning it was already too far. I’m sorry.”

“I did, and still do appreciate the intent. I don’t think anyone has ever gone to such lengths on my behalf for a favour in my entire life.”

“Well,” Evelyn laughed lightly, “once I commit to something I can tend to be a bit ‘all or nothing’. For better or for worse.”

“For better,” Cullen answered with confidence before he looked away abruptly and rubbed the back of his neck. _There_ it was: the slip in his composure she had learned to look for. Finally they were on more even footing, Evelyn thought smugly, though it did nothing to assuage her own nerves.

“Actually, I know this is probably in poor taste, but I was rather hoping you might do me a favour. Well, kind of. Not really a favour.”

“I would be happy to help,” Cullen answered quickly.

“No, you need to hear it first,” Evelyn said decisively and then her final thread of self-possession snapped and the word vomit began:

“You see I actually have this college reunion coming up. I already said I would be attending ages ago and a lot of people expect me there now but I just found out my ex is going…He is a bit creepy. I mean not a real creeper but not great either you know? Like there is a real creepy vibe but not so much an outright creep factor. Like yes ‘creepy’, but not ‘creeper creepy’.” The bewildered look on Cullen’s face indicated that he was struggling to follow but Evelyn ploughed onwards. “He makes me uncomfortable so I try to keep my distance but if he knows I’m single – and he will because he stalks my social media: creepy like I said – so he’ll think he’s in with a chance and I won’t shake him the whole night. I would rather not go at all now actually – to the reunion - but I don’t feel like I can get out of it and I was hoping you might – only if you are free that is, and want to of course – you might come with me?”

Comprehension finally dawning, Cullen began to look increasingly crestfallen. He cleared his throat. “Evelyn, I want to help you, but haven’t I already proven that my capacity for deception has its limits? I’m not sure it is a good idea. I…don’t know if I can go through with it again,” he explained apologetically. Evelyn had expected this answer.

“I know! I know. Which is why I was thinking maybe it wouldn’t have to be a deception. Not exactly.” Evelyn stared towards the ground, at her own hands twisting endlessly.

“What?” Cullen asked flatly. What was his expression? Horror? Disgust? Evelyn couldn’t bring herself to look up at his face and focused on his shoes, recently polished she noted without surprise.

“We could just _go_ together. If you wanted to. To come with me. To the thing. The reunion. Go to the reunion. You. With me,” Evelyn stuttered and finally managed to risk making eye contact with him. Bravely, she managed a shrug. As if she was nonchalant about the whole idea. As if the tiny bloom of hope in her chest that had gotten her this far wasn’t shrivelling up and dying.

“Go together. Not fake-together?” said Cullen carefully while epitomising the phrase ‘deer in headlights’.

“Yes. Essentially. It is probably stupid but I actually kind of liked…it wasn’t all bad. Those weeks. Or I don’t think so. I sort of enjoyed being fake-together with you. More than some of my actual relationships as it happens.” Cullen stared at her with a dumbstruck expression for so long that her heart sank to somewhere in the basement of the building and Evelyn felt the need to disclaim: “At least I _think_ I did. Perhaps I just got a bit carried away with everything. All or nothing, as I said. Sorry. I shouldn’t have brought it up.” She attempted to diffuse the tension with a forced laugh that fooled no one. Cullen didn’t even react, it was as if he couldn’t even hear her anymore, as if he was staring straight through her.

Evelyn’s humiliation was total and her face was on fire. She had prepared herself for the possibility of rejection, imagined his polite, embarrassed ‘no thank you’ but this…This was inhumane. She wanted to find a toilet to drown herself in. Cullen still said nothing. Couldn’t he at least walk away and leave her, rather than gawking at her mortification.

But no, still he did not leave. Instead he took a step towards her. Evelyn felt her joints lock up she had gone so tense. Cullen was so close now she could smell it again: the oakmoss, the elderflower. He was leaning towards her. Evelyn’s racing brain struggled to comprehend: he wasn’t laughing at her, or storming away he was going to…kiss her? Telling herself not to question it, not to overthink it, she took a step forward too, reached out a hand towards him, titled her face upwards, heart pounding.

The door of the stairwell banged open and they leapt apart. Cullen spun around and Evelyn scurried backwards to put a more work appropriate distance between them until her heels nudged the wall.

“Cullen!” Jim all but burst in, brandishing a sheaf of paper as Evelyn turned to examine the handrail as if it was the most fascinating thing she had ever happened upon in her life.

“What?” Cullen spat in a truly menacing voice that Evelyn was at once frightened and impressed by.

 “I saw this on the printer and I know you said you wanted a copy as soon as it came through…” Jim trailed off as Cullen scowled at him.  

“Not. Now,” Cullen said, with terrifying emphasis.

Evelyn saw Jim’s eyes flick from Cullen, to her, and back again. “I’ll…pop it in your office. Right.” Jim scampered away. The door slammed closed after him.

Evelyn let out a long breath. The moment, whatever it would have been, was lost, and she had a defeated feeling that it may never be reclaimed.

With a sense of resignation Evelyn knew that this was just how it was going to be for Cullen and her: nothing ever quite as it should be, the timing never panning out, the stars never quite aligning. Any courage she had gathered to come here today was gone and it was time to flee and lick her wounds in privacy. Game over. She had tried.

Cullen had a different idea. He turned and swept determinedly towards her, covering the distance so rapidly that startled, Evelyn instinctively tried to move, back hitting the wall. An unformulated sentence died on her lips and she may have let out a slightly strangled sound instead. He cupped her face in both hands, palms hot even against her burning cheeks and paused, for the barest of moments, eyes alight with an unfamiliar intensity. Evelyn recognised the hesitation as a courtesy, not uncertainty: he knew what he wanted. Finally. She reached out without breaking eye contact, groped and took hold of the lapels of his jacket, tugging him forward, signalling permission. Signally urgency. Signalling ‘don’t you dare back out now just when we are finally making progress or Maker help me I will break that potted succulent right over your head’.

It was enough for Cullen and he quickly closed the distance between them. Evelyn could sense his certainty, and despite her earlier irritation at his composure she was glad he managed to regain it just at this moment. He pressed his lips firmly against hers, his thumbs simultaneously stroking her cheeks. Still slightly stunned, it sent a jolt through Evelyn when he moved to deepen the kiss, tilting his head to find a better angle as she remained unhelpfully frozen. It finally occurred to her to respond. And she did. Enthusiastically. Evelyn released his lapels and hooked her arms underneath his, running her hands up his back, fingers splayed before using the firmer purchase to pull her body closer to his, the last of the space between them evaporating. Pressed against him she clung on tightly, as if she was afraid to let go and maybe in that moment she was. The tip of her tongue brushed along his lower lip and she flushed with warm pride when it elicited a brief, deep moan from him. He broke contact, looked at her, expression more tender than she had ever seen it, then quickly kissed her again, featherlight, just on the corner of her slightly tingling mouth.

This was all new, but like in so many other instances over the past few weeks, it all seemed so familiar. So right. It was wonderful. It was confusing. Very confusing.

Evelyn released her grip around him, withdrew her arms and folded them about herself. Pulling away in earnest too and releasing her face, Cullen fingers brushed over the sensitive skin at her throat, causing a shiver to run up her spine. Evelyn wondered if that was intentional, and decided she wouldn’t put it past him. He took a step back. She might have too if she wasn’t up against the wall. She looked at him: shell shocked. He looked at her: brow creased with worry. His Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed, and Evelyn could see that old uncertainty settling over him once more like a cloak.

“I’m sorry -” he began but Evelyn began to talk over the top of him before he could complete whatever ridiculous sentiment was forthcoming.

“Don’t you dare apologise. I could see that you wanted to do that,” she teased, but her voice was warm, reassuring.

“For longer than I care to admit,” he said in a way that made her heart thud rapidly for a few beats. He couldn’t quite supress a smirk. But it faded, and he continued, haltingly: “I just never thought that you would want…What I want. I didn’t think it was possible.”

“I’ve asked you out twice now, and at least one of those was real. How could you possibly have any doubts?”

He chuckled, and some of the tension left his frame, his shoulders dropping slightly, his stance becoming less rigid. “So you have,” he said softly.

Emotions still fluctuating wildly, she rounded on him. “And why didn’t you say something? I thought I was losing my mind for a second there: I couldn’t tell what was real anymore,” she laughed as she spoke, but there was a genuine exasperation in her tone that she couldn’t quite conceal.  He looked immediately wounded and she regretted saying it.

“I had doubts, and I was a coward. Things got…complicated,” he said. That was a frustrating understatement, and a thoroughly inadequate excuse but he looked dejected enough, guilty enough, that Evelyn quickly took pity on him: stepping closer, raising herself up on tip toes to wrap her arms around his neck and kiss his jaw.

“Then let’s keep things really simple from now on,” she said in a whisper and in agreement, he tilted his head down to reach her lips once more, his hands moving from her waist to the small of her back, gently urging her closer.

They held the embrace for a long while, Evelyn tucked her head under his chin, resting her cheek against his shoulder. He kissed the top of her head. “They’ll be wondering where we are. Our colleagues,” Cullen said, remorsefully, as if it pained him to say it.

Evelyn groaned. “Does it matter? I think we have already reached peak controversy.”

“Perhaps not, but if we stay here much longer I will have to tell Rosalie our real first date was us just standing in a stairwell and she might actually implode with dismay.”

Evelyn balked a little, stomach swooping at the thought that they were going to have to…clarify a few things with Cullen’s family. But she couldn’t think about that right now and ruin the moment. One step at a time. “What are you suggesting?”

“We reconvene, later, and do something worthier of a retelling.”

“Ooh, mysterious. You’re right, that might take the sting out of the shock of telling them we are together. Again.”

Cullen and laughed and moved away so he could look at her properly, expression fond, smile gentle. “I don’t think they’ll be shocked.”

Evelyn smiled too, but felt a hot, self-conscious blush creeping up her neck and burning at the tips of her ears. “You’re right, I really should be getting back.” They broke apart, Cullen catching her hand briefly and quietly saying: “Until later,” before she began on the steps back up towards her floor. Nearly at the top of the first flight, Evelyn hesitated, realising she hadn’t heard the door behind her. Sure enough, she turned to see Cullen, standing where she had left him and grinning up at her broadly, almost ridiculously.

Descending as rapidly as she was capable of, she made it to about the third step from the bottom before she gave up and all but launched herself back into his arms which were wide open and ready to receive her.

* * *

**EPILOGUE - some months later...**

 

Cullen had barely left the table to buy the next round of drinks when the rest of the group rounded on her. “Is it my imagination,” Dorian began, “or has that man developed a sense of humour?”

“It may not have been intentional, but I think that was actually a joke,” Varric added. “I was so surprised I almost forgot to laugh. Your influence I assume Evelyn?”

“Hardly, you’re just getting to know him for the first time,” Evelyn said, eating an olive with a shrug.

“No, there is a change. You’ve changed him,” Bull said, assertive as usual and leaving no room for argument.

“I don’t _want_ to change him. He doesn’t need changing,” Evelyn said defensively. She hated the idea that they thought he needed fixing: it was condescending. They were overestimating her and underestimating him.

Josephine, ever the moderator, leapt to clarify. “We’re not accusing you of anything Evelyn. We are only just getting to know him, as you say. Give us a chance to catch up.”

“Yeah, we need to catch up after you both kept your dalliance a ‘secret’ for so long,” Varric said with a snort which indicated that everyone at the table knew that it had been the worst kept secret in Sky Holdings history since Cassandra punched a client who tried to grope her.

“Though he does seem lighter somehow. And so do you,” Josephine continued.

“Which is odd, as anyone would think a pairing of the two worst workaholics in the company would at least treble their workaholic-ness,” Dorian mused.

Evelyn pondered this over another olive.  “We force each other to take more breaks I suppose. Neither of us could ever convince ourselves to stop working for five consecutive minutes, but apparently, we can persuade each other.  Although, when he has his mind set on something he can be very difficult to distract.”

“I am certain you are more than capable of providing very ample distractions, Evelyn,” Leliana said in such a suggestive way that Sera snorted, and took beer up her nose. The group laughed and Evelyn tried to look displeased. A traitorous blush crept onto her cheeks which only seemed to confirm the group’s assumptions.

Evelyn scowled. “You all have filthy minds.”

“Who has a filthy mind?” Cassandra had arrived and was helping Cullen by conveying some of the drinks from the bar to the table while he waited for the rest to be made.

“Cassandra,” Varric greeted her and they looked at each other with their usual, mutual sceptisim. “We were hoping you would arrive in time for a game of Wicked Grace.”

“Ugh, I have no intention in participating in your gambling ring.”

“Should have known,” Varric sighed. “The revelation that Cullen can play was enough of a shock for one night. It would have been too much to think that you might lower yourself to have some fun.”

“You can sit out with me,” Evelyn interrupted tactfully. “I can’t stand the game.”

“At least we know Cullen can’t be any worse at it than you are. No offense Evelyn,” Bull said. Evelyn shook her head to indicate that no offense was taken.

“Oh, he is an accountant, used to dealing with numbers. He might be a dark horse,” Josephine said, sounding troubled.

“Don’t you start feigning worry. We all know you are the master of this game,” Varric said, rolling his eyes.

“Cullen doesn’t,” she said sounding suddenly incredibly sly eliciting dark chuckles from the group. Josephine shot Evelyn a clear look which said ‘don’t warn him.’

“My lips are sealed,” Evelyn said, just before Cullen returned. He plonked a glass of wine down in front of her before offloading the rest of the drinks.  

“This isn’t what I asked for,” Dorian said, peering at his glass with disgust, brimming with a mystifyingly murky and bright blue coloured liquid.

“No, but as I walked away I overheard you saying that I would definitely get the orders wrong and it seemed unkind to disappoint you.”

“Ha ha,” Dorian said drily but smiled all the same. “I am going to have to watch my tongue around you: I had no idea you were so sassy.” Cullen just shrugged looking pleased with himself. “So what toxic monstrosity have you acquired for me then?”

Cullen took his time to answer, drawing out the suspense, carefully pulling out the chair beside Evelyn and sitting down before giving Dorian a level look. “Exactly what you asked for. I just asked the bar staff if they had any food colouring.”

The group erupted into laughter again and even Cassandra chuckled along, as Dorian gave Cullen a slow clap and said: “Very crafty.”

Proud, tipsy and generally pleased with how the evening was going, Evelyn shifted in her seat so she could lean against Cullen’s side, wrapping her arm around his and beaming up at him. Watching them, Sera screwed her face up and said something under her breath that was lost in the din but may have been ‘yuck’. But Cullen and Evelyn gazed at each other oblivious, grins fading to smiles softer, more affectionate. A bright flash of light startled them. Photo taken, Varric lowered his phone and began punching at it with his thumbs.

“Don’t post that,” Evelyn said, thinking of Cullen’s family, however the protest was both weak and belated.

Cullen let out a long exhale. “It’s okay, they had to find out sooner or rather.” He was right. While they hadn’t set out to keep their new – or renewed – relationship a secret precisely, there had been a mutual agreement not to rush things. Not to rush things between themselves, and not to rush to tell their friends (though it was definitely obvious) or family (thought it may have still been obvious). There were certain pressures that their fledgling relationship could do without.

They had needed space and now, as a calmness and certainty had settled between them, it was time to face Cullen’s family. Though her heart was still racked by the echoes of guilt from the night of Branson’s wedding, Evelyn’s nerves were tempered by her wish to speak to Mia again. And to generally apologise, to meet Branson properly and to entertain Rosalie with some true exploits of her brother. Evelyn’s heart sunk. Maker, they were going to have to tell _her_ parents too. Her mother would be insufferable.

Cullen, though unable to read her thoughts, seemed to be monitoring the parade of emotions as they flashed across her face and he gave her an encouraging smile. “We’re going to be okay,” he reassured her.

“We are,” Evelyn agreed. Of that, she couldn’t be more confident.

This time, Sera’s ‘yuck’ and the gagging noises that had preceded it were both clearly audible, and thoroughly ignored.

* * *

 

The next morning, Evelyn titled her head first one way, then the other, surveying Cullen’s sleeping form. It would be cruel to wake him true, but she herself had woken well over an hour ago and frankly, found herself incredibly bored. When stretching violently and yawning obnoxiously failed to rouse him, she resorted to poking him in the shoulder. Then again, hard.

He let out a disgruntled groan, looked at her with glazed eyes and let out an: “ow” so miserable she almost felt bad. Instead of apologising she said a cheerful: “Good morning!”

“Is it?”

“Now don’t be like that, it _is_ a good morning. The birds are singing, the sun is shining…” Cullen looked unconvinced so Evelyn continued: “and I’m here.”

He simultaneously stretched and smiled a long, languorous grin at her before saying in a husky voice: “You’re right, it’s perfect.”

Evelyn melted a little at that, but didn’t want to let him know he was gaining the upper hand. “So all good things considered, you can’t let one – or several humiliating defeats at Wicked Grace get you down and keep you moping in bed all day.”

The grin slipped from his face. “Why did you have to bring that up?”

“It wasn’t _all_ bad.”

“It was from my perspective.”

“No one suspects Josephine until it is too late.”

“So this is a sadistic rite of passage is it? You all went through the same ordeal?”

“Well, not precisely the same ordeal.” Evelyn conceded. “They added some new twists for you.”

Cullen draped an arm over his eyes. “I need to start looking for a new job.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.  It is good they got to see you with your guard down a bit.”

“They saw a lot more of me than I would have liked,” Cullen said drily.

Evelyn stifled a chuckle then reached over to give him a little shove. “Come on, you’re wasting the day.”

“I’m exhausted.”

“Your stamina is clearly flagging,” Evelyn said, but he did not rise to the jibe and instead rolled over onto his side so his back was facing her. She glared at the bare, lightly freckled expanse of it. “And how long did you stay up reading after we got back here? Don’t think I didn’t see the lamp go back on. You don’t get enough sleep.”

“I would sleep now if you would let me,” he muttered.

“Fine, I’ll leave you to it,” Evelyn snapped, throwing back the covers and leaping up to start gathering her clothes. She was baiting him of course, which he well knew, but it was enough to motivate him to lurch upright into a sitting position, sheet pooling his lap.

“Very well, you’re right. We shouldn’t waste a day off.”

Evelyn gave him a narrow look before she pulled her shirt over her head. “Actually, you look terrible. Maybe you _should_ sleep.”

He dragged a hand down his face. “Are you being intentionally fickle?”

She smiled sweetly at him. “A little, yes.” She darted back to the bed to lean across and kiss him on the cheek. “I’m sorry. You’re so easy to tease when you’re like this.” She illustrated her point by ruffling his hair, before bouncing away to find a missing sock.

“A sitting duck apparently. Where you find the energy…”

“From sleeping,” she said, rolling her eyes. “Honestly, how you still manage to get to work at the crack of dawn every day is beyond me.”

“Caffeine combined with a very well-established routine,” Cullen explained, the final word half melting into a yawn.

Evelyn, fully dressed now, shook her head at him and sighed. “Speaking of which, perhaps I will nip around the corner and grab us both a coffee. Something to eat too,” she said, thinking longingly of pastries and placing a hand over her stomach which felt hollow. “And while I do that you can slowly commence the getting up process.”

“I have a coffee machine.”

“You know I can’t work that thing. Why does it have so many buttons? It should have one function – make coffee. What on earth are the rest of them there for? It baffles me! And unless one of those buttons causes the machine to spit out a freshly baked croissant it is as good as useless to me right now.”

“Fine. Go get coffees. Good plan,” he agreed clearly lacking the strength to argue and taking his keys, she headed for the front door. It was chilly now she was up, and she hesitated, before gratefully grabbing her hoodie from the arm of the sofa: right from where it had lain unmoved since the first night she had met Mia.

Evelyn had laughed when she had seen it there, one night after they had given up on picking a restaurant and brought takeout back to his apartment instead. “Maker I have been looking all over for that. I completely forgot I left it here.”

“Planted it here more like,” Cullen had said, closing the door behind them. “I had intended to return it to you. After the wedding.”

“Why didn’t you then?”

“I meant to. I just…it just felt so final.”

Evelyn felt a resurgence of an old irritation: he could have given her the hoodie, not to mention called, emailed or just spoken to her instead of making her chase him down. But it that horrid, uncertain week was long over. She had already forgiven his self-doubt and instead of bringing it up said suspiciously: “Were you keeping a shrine to me?”

She was teasing but he replied: “I’m not going to deny that I liked the reminder.”

“That is sweet,” Evelyn said, “but it I find a jar of my nail clippings somewhere around here we are going to have to have a serious discussion.”

He rolled his eyes. “I had better hide my collection of your discarded coffee cups.” Evelyn laughed and Cullen took a step towards the sofa to retrieve the hoodie.

She stopped him, hand on his arm. “You may as well leave it there now. The weather is starting to turn cold.” He looked at her, uncomprehending. “I might need it.”

Maker he could be frustratingly obtuse sometimes. It was better now, but the first few weeks, months even, of their relationship had seen him in a near constant state of surprise. Not as if he kept forgetting that they were together, but like he didn’t fully believe it until she made some small gesture to remind him, to prove it to him.

Evelyn could relate: things had worked out almost too neatly to believe and she hadn’t minded finding ways to reassure him. The dawning comprehension when she kissed him unexpectedly. The stuttering joy when she surprised him with a visit. The flustered ‘Oh. Hello,’ when she said she had called just to hear his voice. The blush and the inevitable neck rub when she took his hand in public were reward enough. Nonetheless, it was a relief that he finally seemed convinced that they were actually a couple.

When Evelyn returned, coffees and brunch held victoriously before her, she had expected to see Cullen in the living area. Perhaps growing impatient for her return and fiddling with that wretched coffee machine, or on the sofa with his book from the previous night. But he was nowhere to be seen. Placing her load down on the table, she wondered if he was showering but could hear no running water. Lips pursed and arms folded her suspicions were confirmed when she returned to the bedroom and found him fast asleep; laying on his stomach, head turned towards her vacated pillow.

Knowing she was beaten and not really minding, Evelyn kicked off her shoes, crawled back onto the mattress and curled up beside him. He did not stir as she wedged herself as close to him as possible, let out a long, contended sigh and kissed his shoulder, amused by his blissfully peaceful expression.

“I love you,” she whispered.

It surprised her when, without opening his eyes, and with the faintest, ghost of a smile on his lips, he whispered back: “I love you too.”

Just as they were both dozing off, Evelyn heard Cullen’s phone ping and her own vibrate simultaneously. Not curious enough to investigate at that moment, she temporarily ignored the email from Mia, flagged as urgent, subject line uncharacteristically capitalised reading: ‘YOU TWO HAVE SOME EXPLAINING TO DO’ and the body of the message consisting solely of a link to Varric’s photo from the previous night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We made it! They made it! *Gives them both a gold star* Hurrah! I can't overstate how much I have enjoyed writing this and how much I have appreciated everyone's company and the incredible feedback - thanks so much for reading.


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